Growth and Infrastructure Bill

Debate between John McDonnell and Lord Stunell

Monday 17th December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Stunell (Hazel Grove) (LD)]

I tabled amendments 40 and 41. I look forward to hearing what my right hon. Friend the Minister has to say about Government amendments 64 and 65, which go a long way towards meeting the concerns that lie behind amendment 40.

I agree with the hon. Member for Edinburgh South (Ian Murray) in one respect. When the Committee took evidence, we heard from a succession of Jonahs. Neither the TUC nor the CBI was exactly over the moon about the Government’s proposals, and, indeed, all the outside organisations that gave evidence had criticisms to make. I particularly noted the words of a senior employment lawyer, who said, in plain terms, that he would not encourage any of his clients—that is, employers—to take advantage of the measure. The CBI described it as a very small niche product. However, my amendments are intended to deal not with circumstances in which it will be a niche product, but with circumstances in which all the evidence that the Committee received turns out to have been too pessimistic about its success. If that proves to be the case, it is important that the Minister’s plainly expressed intentions are clearly met, and that no employees are forced to accept a deal that they do not consider to be suitable for them and their circumstances. Amendment 40 makes it clear that there should be no detriment to such employees.

I am happy to say that Government amendments 64 and 65 appear to cover exactly the same territory, and—as is the way with Government drafting, as opposed to Back-Bench drafting—probably more thoroughly and comprehensively than I did. I therefore do not intend to press amendment 40, although whether I do so will depend on what the Minister says about the Government amendments. I assume that they are intended to provide safeguards against two possible outcomes. Amendment 64 would prevent an employee who turned down a contract of this kind from discrimination or other disadvantages in the workplace, while amendment 65 would ensure that the dismissal of such an employee constituted an unfair dismissal in employment law. That more or less covers what I was trying to do in amendment 40.

I have not yet been able to detect a Government amendment that matches amendment 41, but, again, I look forward to hearing what the Minister has to say. My amendment is designed to deal with circumstances in which a vacancy arises in a firm that has adopted the proposed structure, and a jobcentre sends someone to the firm to apply for the job. As was pointed out by the hon. Member for Edinburgh South, the current policy of the Department for Work and Pensions is, rightly, that those who are receiving benefit and are directed to vacant posts have a duty to consider them, and, if they constitute reasonable offers of employment, to accept them. If they do not do so, their benefits will be suspended or withdrawn. My amendment proposes that if people refuse jobs because they are offered an employee-owner contract, that will not be grounds for the suspension of their benefits and for them to be put at a disadvantage. If they do not have some protection of that sort, it will be impossible for the Government to fulfil their clear commitment, which was confirmed by the Minister in Committee, that no one would be forced into such a relationship. Again, I look forward to hearing from the Minister, and, having done so, I may or may not choose to press amendment 41.

I hope it is clear to the House that my central objection is not to a new or alternative type of employment contract. I have no problem with that. The problem will arise if the power relationship between employer and employee is so out of balance that the employee does not have the discretion and the free will to refuse and to do something else instead. What I wanted to do, and what my Liberal Democrat colleagues wanted me to do, was ensure that neither those currently in employment nor those prospectively in employment would suffer any detriment in relation to the state benefits system. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response.

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

I heard what my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh South (Ian Murray) said about the inability to amend this part of the Bill, and I sympathise with his view, but I thought that it would be useful for us to test whether the Government’s intention was to adopt a genuine approach to developing the concept of employee ownership or whether this was merely an attack on employment rights. I thought that it would be useful to set out how an employee ownership scheme could be introduced, and that if the Government’s intention was indeed to develop the concept of employee ownership they would support my amendments, or at least commit themselves to tabling amendments to the same effect.

The argument about employee ownership relates to economic democracy. I believe that we should socialise our economy. I believe that individual workers at every level should have control over their own working lives, and that that means democratic control of the firm, the region and the nation. Over the years, the House has debated a variety of methods of bringing that about. We have discussed public ownership, and nationalisation as part of that; co-operation; mutualisation, by which I mean true mutualisation and not the alternative description of privatisation employed by the present Government; and worker ownership models, which have included the extension of employee ownership. A range of models have been discussed over the years, including the Scandinavian model—in which share entitlements are given to the workers and then put in trust, gradually amounting to control of the firm itself—and the individual employee ownership model proposed in the Nuttall review.

Localism Bill

Debate between John McDonnell and Lord Stunell

Monday 7th November 2011 Commons Chamber

[John McDonnell]

That is incredibly helpful, because although amendment (a) might not be pressed to a vote, the House in due course—fairly rapidly—will need to look at how undemocratic the City of London corporation actually is.

There are numerous examples of when a referendum in the City of London on the basis of universal suffrage—one person, one vote—would enable residents to address some of the abuses of the system that take place currently. If people want an example of those abuses, they should read the front page of The Guardian today. The City of London corporation has applied City cash—anything up to £100 million in local authority funding that is never audited or publicised; that completely lacks any form of transparency to local residents or the rest of the electorate in both the corporation area or elsewhere; and that is never investigated—to enhance a property development on the edge of the corporation area in Hackney. That also enhances the value of properties owned by Hammerson, which employs the lord mayor of the City of London corporation. A referendum in the City of London area could valuably take place on that matter. Residents could vote on whether it is appropriate for the City of London to enter into developments of that sort.

The Hackney example is not the only one; there was the Spitalfields development and opposition from the Barbican Association. The City of London corporation has ridden roughshod over the wishes of local residents to enhance the profits of businesses which employ council men on the corporation. If the hon. Member for Richmond Park is suggesting that the rules and regulations made under proposed subsection (11) of amendment (a) would ensure universal suffrage in the City of London corporation, it would be a major breakthrough for democracy in London.

I hope that the amendment is pressed to a Division if we gain assurances from all who have tabled the amendment that that is what it means. Even if we cannot use the amendment to prise open democracy in the City of London corporation, there will be other opportunities. Hon. Members from all parties should try to place this matter firmly on the agenda again, because allowing businesses to have the vote and to ride roughshod over the wishes of local residents in the corporation area is 21st-century abuse of power and democracy.

[Andrew Stunell]

We have had an interesting and wide-ranging debate, with plenty of interest added by Members’ personal experiences.

I appreciate the decision of my hon. Friend the Member for Richmond Park (Zac Goldsmith) not to press amendment (a) to a Division. He will have seen in the course of the debate that the force is not with him, although he has raised a number of interesting aspects, which I am sure he will ensure are kept in front of the House in the years to come.

Other hon. Members have raised a wide range of issues, and perhaps the most persistent raiser of issues was the hon. Member for Hyndburn (Graham Jones), who is not in the Chamber. This part of the Bill applies to local authorities; it does not attempt, and it never did attempt, to regulate community groups, neighbourhood forums or other non-governmental organisations. However, I remind the House that there is still a requirement on anybody spending public money to give a proper account of that spending and to be held accountable, if necessary in the courts, should they fail to do so. On the wider duty on anybody spending public money, the introduction of the equalities duty provides a substantial safeguard and remedy for those who feel hard done by as a consequence. I hope that the House will accept that as the right basis on which to proceed.

My hon. Friend the Member for Elmet and Rothwell (Alec Shelbrooke) told us a shaggy bear story, but hidden behind it were some important observations, one of which was about the present system’s extensive capacity for creating trouble for council members going about their lawful business and trying to serve their community. He referred to a case in which essentially he was being bullied by a developer because of views he had expressed on a planning application. I am happy to tell him that, quite apart from our abolition of the Standards Board, our abolition of the pre-determination legislation, which is also right at the front of the Bill, will put in place a safeguard in such situations.

My hon. Friend the Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole (Annette Brooke) drew attention to the hard work done in the House of Lords, not least by our Liberal Democrat colleagues. Government Members acknowledge the fruitful dialogue in the Lords, which I believe has produced a much-improved Bill. She suggested that it might be appropriate for us to return to the standards regime and monitor its performance after a couple of years. More broadly, the Government have said that they want to monitor the impact of legislation as time goes by, and I hope that she will understand that the House always has the capacity to return to matters. No doubt the Select Committee and others will keep an eye not only on that provision in the Bill, but on all the others.

I heard the contribution from my hon. Friend the Member for Rochester and Strood (Mark Reckless), particularly on police and police commissioners. My right hon. Friend the Minister of State, who has responsibility for decentralisation, has recently written to my hon. Friend about that matter, and I know that the Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice has also offered to liaise with him. I assume that he will want to take up that offer. He made several observations about what would happen in the United States, but I have reason to suspect that he is not in favour of introducing a federal system in the United Kingdom. In default of a federal system, we have to manage our own resources of governance.

On council tax referendums, I made the point in my introductory remarks that we are replacing a top-down limitation on what councils can spend and raise from the council tax with a process controlled by the electorate—the ones who pay for it—which is how local accountability is supposed to work in our democratic system. As those who did an A-level in this area will know, that is what we are all taught happens, but what has not happened for many years. We are changing a top-down financial control system to a bottom-up control system. In the eyes of my hon. Friend the Member for Rochester and Strood, that might not be perfect, but I hope that he would accept that it is more than just a small notional improvement.

--- Later in debate ---

[John McDonnell]

I shall be extremely brief. I wholeheartedly welcome this part of the Bill and the amendments proposed, but I would also welcome some advice from the Minister on the time scale for the implementation of the Bill and this bit of it. I shall quickly give a relevant example.

In my constituency, a library has been closed and a new one opened. I did not get everything I wanted, but I congratulate the local authority on opening the new library. For some time, there has been an expectation—indeed, promises have been made by the local authority in the past—that the previous and now redundant library would be handed over for community use. Despite a petition signed by more than 4,000 people urging the local authority to provide this facility for community use in some form, the London borough of Hillingdon is now rushing ahead with its sale. Last week, the authority actually gave itself planning permission for housing, despite the fact that I appeared at the petition hearing with the petition and directly quoted words of wisdom from the Secretary of State. He had cited a library being made redundant as an example of exactly what this Bill is intended to address.

So I ask the Minister about the London borough of Hillingdon’s undue haste to give itself planning permission for housing and to sell the site off to pre-empt the coming into force of this Bill. Will he assure me that something can be done to persuade the authority to listen to the local people and enable us to use this Bill for the purposes for which it was intended: to empower local people in respect of just this sort of asset? I would welcome any assurance that he could give, any advice that he might wish to render to the London borough of Hillingdon and anything that he can say about the importance of the community being listened to on such examples.

[Andrew Stunell]

I welcome the hon. Member for City of Durham (Roberta Blackman-Woods) to the Front Bench and welcome her welcome for the amendments that we have introduced. I understand that she obviously has to go through the ritual motions of accusing us of U-turns, but what we actually have is a Government who are listening and ready to share their learning with the House. We did not come to the House with a finished product, as my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State made clear from the moment the Bill was produced. I believe that the Bill has been improved at each stage of its progression and has now reached a state of perfection.

--- Later in debate ---

[John McDonnell]

May I clarify that I am not enticing the Minister to criticise the local authority? However, there is an issue here. A Bill is coming to its conclusion and will shortly be enacted. Should not true a local authority taking a reasonable decision and taking into account all relevant factors take into account the fact that the Government intend the Bill to be implemented rapidly? Should it not therefore act in the spirit of the Bill?

[Andrew Stunell]

Perhaps it would be appropriate for the hon. Gentleman to make sure that the report of this exchange in Hansard is drawn to the attention of the council leader.

I can add a little more information about the timetable. The implementation of the rights requires secondary legislation in accordance with the procedures agreed by the House. Affirmative resolution measures require parliamentary time and consultation and we cannot prejudge exactly what the outcome will be. However, preparatory work is well in hand and the ministerial team certainly intend to get all these rights not only on the statute book but make them effective and active in local communities as soon as possible.