Equality and Human Rights Commission

Jack Dromey Excerpts

Wednesday 1st March 2017 Commons Chamber

[Jack Dromey (Birmingham, Erdington) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Glasgow South West (Chris Stephens) on securing this debate. Like him, for me, combating discrimination and inequality has been a lifelong cause, in my case dating back to my boyhood, when I discovered, to my shock, from my Irish father that when he first arrived in this country seeking lodging houses in Kilburn and Cricklewood, iniquitous signs were put up saying, “No dogs, no Irish.”

For me, this is a cause that I fought in the world of work, taking on bad employers who were discriminating against people, but also challenging practices within the trade union movement. I remember being involved in a battle back in the 1980s against one particular branch of refuse collectors in London who would not allow any black refuse collectors to be employed. We said, “You’re not on,” we took it on, and we changed it.

Likewise, there was the battle within our own ranks to change the image and agenda of the trade union movement on equalities for women. I used to be described in the old T&G as an “honorary sister.” Like the hon. Gentleman, this is a cause that I am passionate about.

In parallel to the big changes that have been won over the last 30 years, there has been the transformation of the image and agenda of politics, and, indeed, the make-up of this place. As my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Camberwell and Peckham (Ms Harman) regularly reminds me, when she was first elected to this House its membership was 97% men.

I actively worked with all the predecessor bodies: the Equal Opportunities Commission, challenging those employers denying people equal pay; the Commission for Racial Equality, challenging those employers who were discriminating in employment; and the old Disability Rights Commission, challenging employers who treated disabled workers shamefully, and those who—this happened often—refused to employ disabled workers despite requirements on them, and who failed to adapt workplaces so that disabled workers could fulfil their potential.

Then the Equality and Human Rights Commission was established. I could give numerous examples of its work, but I will give just one. When I was deputy general secretary of the union, we had a big focus on the red and white meat industry, which had 40,000 employees. The main customers were the supermarkets, which were abusing their market power to drive down costs along the supply chain. In factory after factory, that led to a two-tier labour market. There were more and more agency workers—overwhelmingly migrant workers—on poorer conditions of employment, and the number of full-time, directly employed workers on better conditions of employment was falling. That often led to toxic conditions and damaged the social cohesion in workplace after workplace and community after community.

I persuaded the then chair of the commission, Trevor Phillips, to launch an inquiry into that discriminatory pattern in the meat industry. It produced a powerful report, and I will never forget being at the summit that was then convened by the EHRC, at which the commission told the supermarkets that if they did not change their procurement practices and end the shameful discrimination in their supply chain, it would take enforcement proceedings against them. The supermarkets are not all that they should be—that is for absolute certain—but some welcome changes were made. They could not wash their hands of responsibility for what they had created.

My experience of the predecessor bodies and the commission has been that they did not always get it right, did not always do everything I would have liked them to do, and did not always bind others in quite the way I would have liked, but they were powerful, effective champions of equality with a dedicated staff fighting that most noble cause of tackling discrimination.

The position that we have now reached is nothing short of scandalous, just when hate is on the march. It is on the march against black, Asian and ethnic minority people, against the disabled and against women. The signs of what is happening in our country are profoundly disturbing. We have never needed a strong Equality and Human Rights Commission more, but it is now being reduced to a rump of its once great self. It is quite extraordinary that its budget has been reduced from £70 million in 2007 to £17 million now. Likewise, the number of staff is also being reduced to a rump, rendering the commission increasingly ineffective. The staff are being treated shamefully. I know some of the staff in the Birmingham office, including my good friend Zahid Nawaz. He has done outstanding work for the predecessor bodies and the commission for 17 years, but he and others were treated shamefully when they were sacked in circumstances that I would not expect from a bad employer, let alone the Equality and Human Rights Commission.

The commission has acted badly and shamefully, and it must think again. It should suspend the dismissal notices issued to the individuals concerned. It should also do something that it has as yet failed to do, which is talk to all the stakeholders with whom it operates about the kind of commission they want for the future. I know, having spoken to some of them, that there is an overwhelming sense of deep concern about what is happening. Fairness and the cause of tackling discrimination demand nothing less.

I turn now to the Minister for Universities, Science, Research and Innovation, the hon. Member for Orpington (Joseph Johnson), who is a reasonable man. I am not sure that I would say that about every Minister. The Government cannot wash their hands of responsibility for what is happening to the Equality and Human Rights Commission because the enormous cuts that are being made are at the heart of all this. As the hon. Member for Glasgow South West said, the Government cannot talk about their commitment to the principle of equality while at the same time cutting the EHRC, making it more difficult for people to go to employment tribunals and robbing citizens of their ability to have their rights enforced and of the protection of the EHRC, which is needed now more than ever. The commission has a responsibility and it must act, but above all, the Government have the key responsibility and they too should act.