Strikes (Minimum Service Levels) Bill

Janet Daby Excerpts

Consideration of Lords amendments
Monday 22nd May 2023 Commons Chamber

[Kevin Hollinrake]

I will make some progress. Lords amendment 2 would require a consultation be carried out and reviewed before use was made of the power to make regulations setting minimum service levels. The primary stated motivation for tabling the amendment was to increase parliamentary scrutiny of the regulations implementing minimum service levels. Although there may be some merit to the intentions behind the amendment, it is, in the Government’s view, duplicative, and would ultimately delay the implementation of the policy. For those reasons, we disagree with it.

I turn to Lords amendments 4 and 5, and the associated tidying amendments, Lords amendments 6 and 7. In the Government’s view, the amendments were tabled to make the Bill inoperable.

[Janet Daby (Lewisham East) (Lab)]

Will the Minister explain how the legislation complies with all International Labour Organisation conventions?

[Kevin Hollinrake]

We believe that it does. The ILO endorses the use of minimum service levels to make sure that the provision of public services is maintained during periods of industrial action. We are happy with our position on that.

We resist Lords amendments 4 to 7 on the principle that the Government have a duty to pass effective legislation. It is regrettable that Opposition Lords have sought to undermine that principle. Lords amendment 4 would mean that there were no consequences for a worker who did not comply with a work notice. The Government disagree with the amendment, as without those consequences, employers would be powerless to manage instances of non-compliance, and strikes would continue to have a disproportionate impact on the public. That would severely undermine the effectiveness of the legislation. Given that the amendment would make the Bill ineffective, as I suspect the Opposition intended, the Government cannot support it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Angela Rayner]

The hon. Member makes a crucial point, which I was trying to make to the Minister: on non-strike days, minimum service levels do not apply at the moment. Many of the people providing our public services are absolutely screaming at the Government, “We need more people working in those services. We are having record vacancies. We are having people leave the profession because of the mismanagement by this Conservative Government.” Take our fire and rescue services: how does the closure of 80 fire stations across the UK keep the public and our brave firefighters safe? Take our precious NHS: how does having 7.3 million patients left on waiting lists keep people safe? And take our overstretched schools: how do record teacher vacancies keep our children safe?

[Janet Daby]

Is my right hon. Friend aware that the Regulatory Policy Committee’s opinion, published on 21 February, red-rated the Government’s impact assessment for the Bill as “not fit for purpose”? Does she agree that, in fact, it is the Government who are not fit to govern?

[Angela Rayner]

I absolutely agree. How will threatening key workers with the sack in the middle of an unprecedented recruitment and retention crisis do anything to provide the level of services that the public deserve?

We will also hear tonight that the Bill brings us into line with international standards, but what does the Minister have to say to the ILO’s director general who slammed down the Bill in January? The Minister did not effectively answer the questions that were put to him during his opening statement. What does he say to President Biden’s labour Secretary, who also raised concerns?

We are going to hear that the Bill is the only way to bring strikes to a close. We are now in May and there is no end in sight to the current wave of industrial action, harming the public, small businesses and, not to mention, the workers who lose a day’s pay. Might I give the Minister some friendly advice? Strikes are ended by getting round the table, not by insulting the very workers who kept the country going during the depths of the pandemic.

The Bill is one of the most sinister attacks on working people I have seen, and I speak as a trade unionist, an employer and a Member of this House. It gives Ministers the power to threaten every nurse, firefighter, health worker, rail worker or paramedic with the sack. Other Government Members wanted even more people to be in scope. I do not think they want anybody anywhere to have trade union rights in this country. This is being done at their whim. They have literally gone from clapping nurses to sacking nurses.

In the words of my noble Friend Baroness O’Grady, Lords amendment 4 is about

“the individual freedoms, dignity and livelihoods of workers.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 26 April 2023; Vol. 829, c. 1242.]

Labour is proud to support that amendment. We ask any Government Member—there are not many of them here—who believes in the right to protection from unfair dismissal to vote with us tonight.

We also stand by the provision in Lords amendment 4 to require employers to serve work notices and to prove that individuals have received them. The Government’s proposal not only threatens workers, but burdens employers, including our overstretched public services and small businesses. That only goes to show the Bill’s complete unworkability and proves the point of all employers who have condemned it.

The Bill also represents an almighty attack on trade unions—unions made up of ordinary working men and women. We are all grown up enough to acknowledge the integral role they play in our economy and our democracy. I think we can all agree that attempts to attack their ability to represent their members is morally, economically and democratically wrong. In its original form, the Bill would require them to take “reasonable steps” to ensure compliance work with notices, without any clarity on what that means. The Government have effectively conceded the flaws in their drafting of the Bill in their concession on Lords amendment 3. That is welcome, but not enough. The Minister asks us to vote tonight for vague and unclear wording that gives us no idea of what they actually require trade unions to do. So we will vote to keep Lords amendment 5 and by extension, Lords amendments 6 and 7.