Employment Rights Bill

John McDonnell Excerpts

Tuesday 11th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Nick Timothy]

I do not see why the Government should not support this new clause. This seems to be an obvious example of labour market abuse, but the difference with many of the provisions in the Bill is that my new clause does not directly benefit trade unions who pay for the Labour party.

Sadly, we know that there have been many sexual assaults and attacks committed by substitute workers. New clause 105 proposes the robust regulation of substitution clauses. Amazon, Uber, Deliveroo and the rest would have to do their due diligence and, just like everyone else, ensure that all their riders are who they say they are and have the right to work in this country. Introducing such a change would reduce labour abuse, protect our communities and deliver a fairer labour market.

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Ind)]

I refer to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. Just to inflame matters more, I am the chair of the RMT parliamentary group as well.

Next Monday is the third anniversary of the P&O scandal. Members might recall what happened: 800 members of staff—RMT members, largely—turned up for work and were sacked by video. Many of them were marshalled off their vessels by trained bouncers and guards who dealt with them roughly. The reaction across the House and across society was that this was repellent and should not happen in a civilised society. The Labour party then made a commitment that it would introduce legislation that would install in law the seafarers’ charter, and that is exactly what the Bill does, so I welcome it wholeheartedly and congratulate the Minister on doing this. But as he can guess, we see this as just the first step, because there is so much more to do, particularly in this sector, where many workers are still exploited compared with shore-based workers.

Government new clause 34 extends the maximum period of the protective award from 90 days to 180 days. We were looking for an uncapped award, to be frank, because P&O built into the pricing the amount it would be fined as a result of its unlawful behaviour, so that did not matter to P&O—it simply priced that in.

In addition, we were looking for injunctive relief, and I thank the Government for entering into discussions about that. Many employers can get injunctive relief on the tiniest error by a union in balloting procedures, but workers cannot. We are asking for a level playing field. We hoped that an amendment would be tabled to the Bill today, but it has not been. We hope the Government will enter into those discussions and go further.

[Andy McDonald]

I wonder whether my right hon. Friend recalls the evidence of Peter Hebblethwaite, the chief executive of P&O Ferries, to the Business and Trade Committee. He made it clear that he deliberately broke the law and had no regard for it. Was my right hon. Friend as horrified as I was to see that in this House, and as disappointed at the lack of response from the Conservative party?

[John McDonnell]

I think that across the House it took a long while to recover from the anger at the behaviour that was displayed in front of the Select Committee. The chief executive was acting with impunity because he had been able to price in those sorts of fines, and it was a cross-party view that we were angry about that behaviour. That is why the charter is so important to us, and why injunctive relief that is open to trade unions would provide an adequate starting point for getting some form of justice.

A range of other issues need to be addressed, including schedule 4, where the Government are introducing the ability to monitor the behaviour of companies. Harbourmasters monitor some of that behaviour as well, with declarations that companies are abiding by basic health and safety practices—some practices in the past have been frankly terrifying. We want health and safety to be about more than just basic legislation; it is also about rosters and how long people are working. We still have ferry contracts where people are working for 17 weeks without a break. We want to ensure that the regulations cover rosters, as well as holiday pay, sick pay, pensions and ratings training, so that we can start to get some form of accountability within the sector. That is not much to ask for, yet we have given shipping owners £3 billion of tonnage tax exemptions in return for the employment of British seafarers, and I do not think we got a single job as a result of that £3 billion. There is a need for proper regulation of the sector.

I tabled an amendment to ask the Government to stand back once a year and bring a report to the House on how implementation of the Bill is going, and to update us on the implications for maritime law and International Labour Organisation conventions, and the impact on the sector. A lot of debate on this issue has been about ferries, but we want to ensure that the provisions apply to all vessels, not just ferries. One point made by those on the Labour Front Bench when considering the Seafarers’ Wages Bill was that if a ship came into a harbour 52 times a year, the legislation would apply. Now—I do not know why—that has been extended to 120 times year, which means that thousands of workers will lose out because the measure will not apply to them. Will the Government have another conversation about that and see whether we can revert to the original position of the Labour party all those years ago when these scandals happened?

There is not much time but, briefly, I am interested in the extension of sectoral collective bargaining right across the economy. We are doing it with social care, but what I have seen from proposals in the Bill does not look like sectoral collective bargaining to me; it looks simply like an extension of pay review bodies. Indeed, the Bill states that any agreements within those organisations cannot legally be accepted as collective bargaining.

The Bill is not clear about how members of the negotiating body are appointed or by who. We were expecting that it would be 50% employers and 50% trade unions, and I tabled an amendment to try to secure that. We think that the negotiating body should elect its own chair, not that the chair should be appointed by the Secretary of State. We want such bodies to be independent and successful, because I see that as the first step in rolling out sectoral collective bargaining in many other sectors of our economy. That is desperately needed because of the lack of trade union rights and the low pay that exists.

The Bill is a good first step, but there is a long agenda to go through. I look forward not just to the Bill proceeding, but to the Minister bringing forward an Employment Rights (No. 2) Bill in the next 18 months.

[Wera Hobhouse]

I rise to speak in support of new clause 74, which appears in the name of the right hon. Member for Sheffield Heeley (Louise Haigh). I pay tribute to her and to my hon. Friend the Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Layla Moran) who have campaigned on these issues for a long time. New clause 74 seeks to ban non-disclosure agreements that prevent workers from making a disclosure about harassment, including sexual harassment—we have talked about sexual harassment in the workplace for the last four or five hours.

NDAs were initially designed to protect trade secrets by restricting the sharing of certain information, but in recent times they have taken on an entirely different and quite sinister role. They have essentially become the default solution for organisations and individuals to settle cases of misconduct, discrimination and harassment, keeping the extent of such incidents unaccounted for. Incorporating clear provisions to ensure transparency in cases of harassment would strengthen protections for all workers.

Data from Can’t Buy My Silence has revealed some deeply worrying statistics about the misuse of NDAs. In a survey of more than 1,000 people who experienced harassment and discrimination in the workplace, 25% reported being forced to sign an NDA, while an additional 11% stated that they could not say due to legal reasons, implying that they had also signed an NDA. Four times as many women as men sign NDAs, and they are used disproportionately against women of colour.

In Committee, the Minister said that the Government had “reservations” about changing the law in this way, as there may be “unintended consequences”. I struggle to understand why the Government have committed to banning universities from using NDAs in cases of sexual misconduct, harassment and bullying but have not committed to extending those protections to other sectors. NDAs are clearly being used in a totally different way to what they were designed to achieve, and we must stop this before more victims are silenced. I heard the Minister say earlier that he is at least looking at what new clause 74 is trying to achieve.

Despite my concerns about the misuse of NDAs, the Bill as a whole has many very positive provisions. Importantly, it finally legislates to protect workers from third-party harassment. I brought that forward in my original Bill that became the Worker Protection (Amendment of Equality Act 2010) Act 2023, which recently became law. However, it was blocked by amendments made to the Bill in Committee in the House of Lords by the Conservative party, so that such liability and protection from sexual harassment by third parties in the workplace was not created. We have already discussed that several times this afternoon.

I am most pleased that the Government have committed to making workplaces safer through this protection, because that is what this is all about. Creating safer workplaces is good for everyone, including businesses, despite what the Conservative party says. A study by Culture Shift found that 66% of businesses believe that preventing sexual harassment is very important. I do not know what Conservative Members are talking about when they say that their inboxes are full; I have not seen a single email from a business writing to me to say that it is worried about protecting its own employees from third-party harassment. According to WorkNest, three quarters of employers are still concerned about protecting employees from harassment by third parties. Businesses are concerned that they cannot protect their workers from third-party harassment; they clearly want these protections to be included in the Bill.

Too many people still suffer from third-party harassment at work. Amendment 288, which tries to remove those important provisions, is plain wrong. Employers have a duty to ensure the safety of their employees from not just other employees, but third parties who may interact with them in the workplace. That responsibility should be part of their broader commitment to workplace safety. If the Conservative party is truly committed to a world without harassment and sexual harassment in the workplace, why is it still condoning offensive language and behaviour as “banter” and “free speech”, rather than taking a step to support businesses and protect workers from sexual harassment in the workplace, as proposed in the Bill?

I am grateful that the Government have ensured the completion of my Act as it was intended a year or two ago. Although I remain concerned about the misuse of NDAs, I welcome many of the provisions in the Bill. I will be proud to walk through the No Lobby when we come to vote on amendment 288, and I hope that all right-minded people will join me there.