John Redwood
Main Page: John Redwood (Conservative - Wokingham)Department Debates - View all John Redwood's debates with the Department for Education
(9 years, 3 months ago)
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Sajid Javid
The hon. Gentleman will know that the certification officer is the regulator for trade unions, and it is perfectly usual for the regulator to be paid for by those whom they regulate.
John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)
Does the Secretary of State agree that modern unions are at their best when they work with employers to get more skills, better training, higher quality work and better paid jobs, and that strikes are deeply damaging to the interests of the employees as well as the employers?
Sajid Javid
My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. At the heart of this Bill is partnership—partnership between trade unions and employers and other stakeholders. A great example of that can be seen at Toyota in Britain. It has not had one day of industrial action in 20 years, and that is because of the partnership that it rightly has with its trade union.
John Redwood
Does the hon. Lady have a message for people in London trying to get to work or students trying to get to schools or colleges on the tube? Does she think each one of those strikes was right and necessary, and what is her advice to the travelling public?
Ms Eagle
My message is that the Mayor should start doing his job and help to respond to the dispute.
There is no necessity to employ the law in this draconian way, especially when this country already has the most restrictive trade union laws in Europe. The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, the trade group for the human resources sector, has criticised the Bill as an “outdated response” to today’s challenges, commenting that the
“Government proposals seem to be targeting yesterday’s problem instead of addressing the reality of modern workplaces”.