Trade Union Funding

Gerry Sutcliffe Excerpts

Wednesday 29th February 2012 Westminster Hall

[Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to speak under your chairmanship, Mr Owen, and a privilege to introduce this debate. In doing so, may I, as someone who comes from a northern mill town, where my grandmother started weaving in the cotton mill as a young girl and lost much of her education as a result, acknowledge the historic role that trade unions have played in our country throughout the past century in improving and defending workers’ rights? They are worthy of our respect. I acknowledge too the important role that they still play today as a valuable part of our civic society in supporting and advocating workers’ rights and representation.

The debate is not about criticising the work to which I have referred, but about the promotion of transparency, accountability and fairness in the way in which such work is fulfilled—things that I hope we would all agree it is right to promote in public and civic life. It is about ensuring that the right balance is found between effective representation of trade union members and value for money for the taxpayer. Many of us believe that, at the moment, the balance disproportionately disadvantages the taxpayer.

[Mr Gerry Sutcliffe (Bradford South) (Lab)]

On that point, will the hon. Lady give way?

[Fiona Bruce]

I will give way and I am happy to take interventions, but perhaps, in the interests of transparency, the hon. Gentleman will first say which trade union he is a member of and how much money that union has given to his constituency Labour party in the past three years.

[Mr Sutcliffe]

You would not allow me to do that, Mr Owen, on the basis that interventions must be brief, but I will write to the hon. Lady with all the information that she has requested, because I am proud to be a member of a number of trade unions. In the calculation that she has made in relation to transparency and the balance being wrong, how much weight has she put on the amount of work that unions do to help employers to have good industrial relations?

[Fiona Bruce]

I have already recognised the positive work that trade unions do. We are simply saying that it is unfair that taxpayers should have to shoulder the burden of the cost of that work to the degree that they do, particularly when so many of those taxpayers and council tax payers have no connection with the work of those unions.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Gerry Sutcliffe (Bradford South) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce) on securing this debate. I thank her for saying that trade unions are a force for good, and that has also been mentioned in the speeches overall.

I am a member of Unite and of Unison. Unite has contributed to my election funding for many years, and I hope that that continues for many years to come. If it was not for the trade union movement, I would not be here as a Member of Parliament. I was brought up as a trade unionist and my politics came from involvement in trade unions. We need to consider the history of how political development took place, particularly in the Labour party and its relationship with trade unions.

Since becoming a Member of Parliament and being involved in trade union activity, I have also had the dubious pleasure of being the Minister with responsibility for employment and employment rights for three years. For me, the debate hits home. Had the debate been entitled “Review of facility time”, I might have understood the need for a discussion about the issues that affect our local authorities, although I would not have agreed with the need for a review. If we agree with the argument for doing away with facility time for public union officials, what do we do about human resources teams in local authorities? Do we get rid of them next? In reality, these people, from all sides, contribute to making sure that democracy and diplomacy in employment relations goes on.

In my view, there is no case for looking at political levies. The political levy ballot was first introduced in 1980 by the Thatcher Government. The hon. Member for Witham (Priti Patel)) let the cat out of the bag when she talked about the political levy and the transparency of the Union Learning Fund. Most employers—perhaps the hon. Lady would like to check—would agree that that fund is one of the finest things that we did in Government, because it provided the opportunity for working class people to engage in training and develop through higher education and beyond. It was welcomed by most employers, particularly the CBI.

So what is the motivation for today’s debate? I do not think it is about facility time. I think it is about that core issue in the minds of some Conservatives who believe that the relationship with the trade unions and the Labour party is too close, and they want to undo it. That should not be the driving force. We know that the figure of £113 million has come from the TaxPayers Alliance. It states that £80 million was for paid staff time and £33 million was in direct payments, which equates to staff costs of 2,840 full-time equivalent staff. However, those figures do not calculate the savings made by individual staff in the work that they do. A modern country should be looking for good industrial relation patterns.

When I was the Minister with responsibility for employment, I saw the need to ensure that we had genuine co-operation in the workplace, whether it was in the private or public sector, and to ensure that we could get productivity and develop as a competing nation in the world. There will always be difficulties and different aspirations between employers and employees, and that is why we need good human resources departments and good, strong trade union bargaining. I hope that Government Members will reflect on this and not make it a politically motivated campaign. I hope that they heed the words of the hon. Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon), because we need a constructive dialogue with trade unions. If there are issues and problems with buildings and suchlike, it is better to deal with them in a positive way rather than wage a political campaign that will undo the good relationship that exists between employers and employees.