Zero Hours Contracts Bill

Debate between Ian Lavery and Philip Davies

Friday 21st November 2014 Commons Chamber

[Ian Lavery]

rose—

[Philip Davies]

I will give way in a second.

However, I think what we have safely also found out today is that the hon. Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North has much better powers of persuasion than the leader of his party. If only he were leader of his party the party might not be in the dire straits that it is in at the moment.

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[Philip Davies]

We are getting nearer. I fear that if we go much further, we will get a full confession at some point.

[Ian Lavery]

This is a really serious debate, but we seem to be trivialising it, suggesting that the problem is perhaps the fault of my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition. The hon. Member for Bury North (Mr Nuttall) hit the nail on the head. I think it was in 2000 that only 200,000 people in this country were on zero-hours contracts. As we sit in the Chamber today, there are 1.4 million people on zero-hours contracts. That is the real problem. I stand for the total abolition of zero-hours contracts for every single person, regardless of where they work.

[Philip Davies]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. There is a certain amount of dispute over the actual number of people who are on zero-hours contracts. The labour force survey, which collects data on individual workers, not on the number of contracts, and asks employees and not workers for the information, has an estimate for the fourth quarter of 2013 of 583,000 people on zero-hours contracts. There is clearly a dispute over the figures. I am not necessarily saying that the hon. Gentleman and his hon. Friends are wrong in their figures; they have obviously sourced those figures from somewhere. Those who compile the labour force survey have different figures.

I genuinely do not understand the hon. Gentleman’s logic. He seems to be saying that it is absolutely fine for 200,000 people to be on zero-hours contracts, but that it is an absolute scandal for 1.4 million people to be on those contracts. Either zero-hours contracts are a good thing or they are a bad thing. Surely it cannot be a question of, “Because there were only 200,000 people on zero-hours contracts when Labour was in office, that was fine; that was a reason to do absolutely nothing about it and bury our heads in the sand, but now there are a few more of them, it is a massive scandal and we need to do something about it.” Either zero-hours contracts are right or they are wrong. The number of people who are on them cannot be the determining factor.

Welfare Reform Bill

Debate between Ian Lavery and Philip Davies

Wednesday 1st February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Ian Lavery (Wansbeck) (Lab)]

If anyone ever had any doubt about the same old Tories and the nasty party, they have just seen an absolutely fine example of it. I am not surprised by the views of the hon. Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) either, bearing in mind that he said that disabled people should work for less than the minimum wage—well done!

[Philip Davies]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Ian Lavery]

On the issue at hand, one in three of us—

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[Ian Lavery]

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker.

One in three of us suffers from cancer at any one time. I am very unfortunate, as my parents and my wife’s parents all died at a relatively young age.

[Philip Davies]

On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. Is it in order for an hon. Gentleman to make an accusation that five national newspapers apologised for making? Is it in order for him to make the same accusation and then not give way to allow me to correct him? Those five newspapers at least had the courtesy to acknowledge that they had made a mistake.

[Mr Deputy Speaker]

That is not a point of order for the Chair, but you have put the point on the record which I think is what you wished to do.