Draft Trade Union (Levy Payable to the Certification Officer) Regulations 2022 Draft Trade Union (Power of the Certification Officer to impose Financial Penalties) Regulations 2022 Debate
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Jonathan Gullis
Main Page: Jonathan Gullis (Conservative - Stoke-on-Trent North)Department Debates - View all Jonathan Gullis's debates with the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy
Draft Trade Union (Levy Payable to the Certification Officer) Regulations 2022
Draft Trade Union (Power of the Certification Officer to impose Financial Penalties) Regulations 2022
Jonathan Gullis Excerpts(2 years, 3 months ago)
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Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)
Further to that point of order, Mr Davies. Following on from the point made by the right hon. Gentleman, I have not yet had a chance to speak but I am more than happy to declare that I am a member of the NASUWT and was a trade union representative in the last two schools in which I worked.
The Chair
I am sure we are all grateful for that. If we could get back to the debate, I think we would all be very grateful.
Imran Hussain
The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right and adds to the point that I was beginning to make. It is clear that the Government do not recognise or value the importance of our trade unions. Instead, as we see with the measures before us today, they choose to attack rather than support those who are fighting for working people.
Jonathan Gullis
Does the hon. Gentleman share my concerns that trade unions such as the National Education Union were found potentially to have broken the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992 for the £505,000 spent in the 2019 general election on adverts that were overtly party political, attacking the Conservative Government, which would obviously have disenfranchised Conservative members whose hard-earned money had been paid into that trade union?
Imran Hussain
It is clear that the hon. Gentleman misses the point. There are regulators today and, while I do not know about that specific example, breaches of any kind should of course be investigated, but that is not the matter before us today. This is not a new body that is being set to investigate breaches, so I think the hon. Gentleman will perhaps understand that his point is not relevant to the debate today.