Leaving the EU: Protection for Workers

Debate between Greg Clark and Gloria De Piero

Wednesday 6th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Gloria De Piero (Ashfield) (Lab)]

Trust is a big issue here. In July 2016, the Prime Minister told the nation:

“I want to see changes in the way that big business is governed…we’re going to have not just consumers represented on company boards, but workers as well.”

Can the Secretary of State confirm that that promise to workers was broken?

[Greg Clark]

No, what the Prime Minister set out in that speech was to have the voice of workers represented in the boardroom. The action that we have taken in requiring businesses to establish a worker representative, or to have a non-executive director with the function of representing workers, or to have a works council with an influence on the board, was something that I was proud to set out in furtherance of the Prime Minister’s assurance.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Greg Clark and Gloria De Piero

Tuesday 12th February 2019 Commons Chamber

[Greg Clark]

My right hon. Friend is right to say that we need to bring certainty and enable businesses to plan for the future, but she is also fortunate, in that the Prime Minister is about to make a statement on the matter.

[Gloria De Piero (Ashfield) (Lab)]

The mineworkers’ pension scheme has boosted Government coffers by billions while ex-miners and their widows receive an average pension of £80 a week. Will the Secretary of State meet miners’ representatives and the trustees of the scheme to hammer out a fairer pension deal?

Industrial Strategy Consultation

Debate between Greg Clark and Gloria De Piero

Monday 23rd January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Greg Clark]

My hon. Friend is right to point out the prescience of his friends and neighbours in Herefordshire in making their proposal. This is a very good example of precisely the sort of reform that we need, and I think that its prospects are pretty bright.

[Gloria De Piero (Ashfield) (Lab)]

We heard no mention of former coalfield communities such as Ashfield that still mourn the loss of well-paid jobs in the pits. I understand that this is a Green Paper, but what new jobs or tangible differences does the Business Secretary hope to see in communities such as mine, and by when?

[Greg Clark]

There is very much a reference to communities such as those that the hon. Lady mentions. When I talk about parts of the country that have fallen behind the best performing places in terms of productivity, they are the areas and towns that we have in mind—that is essential. It seems to me that one of the foundations for future prosperity is to ensure that the level of skills is higher than it has been for the industries that are expanding. It is particularly in areas such as hers that that transformation can have the greatest effect.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Greg Clark and Gloria De Piero

Tuesday 13th September 2016 Commons Chamber

[Gloria De Piero (Ashfield) (Lab)]

Will the Government look again at the unjust 50% Government clawback from the mineworkers’ pension scheme surplus?

[Greg Clark]

I will certainly take that point away, and I am happy to meet the hon. Lady if she would like to inform me about that outside the Chamber.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Greg Clark and Gloria De Piero

Monday 17th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Gloria De Piero (Ashfield) (Lab)]

Last year the Prime Minister asked local authorities not to do the easy thing by cutting the budgets of voluntary bodies, but week after week representatives of such organisations come to my surgery and tell me that their budgets have been slashed and that they cannot continue to do their work. Does the Secretary of State share my concern about Nottinghamshire county council’s failure to heed the Prime Minister’s advice?

[Greg Clark]

The average cut in the spending power of councils is 4.4%, so there is no excuse for any council to target the voluntary sector disproportionately. I hope that Opposition Front Benchers will be as clear as Ministers in condemning such behaviour.