Speaker’s Statement

Debate between Julian Smith and Gavin Williamson

Tuesday 13th May 2025 Commons Chamber

[Sir Julian Smith (Skipton and Ripon) (Con)]

Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. In his role in the usual channels, Sir Roy Stone had a unique influence in this place, as we have heard, working for decades for the Government Chief Whip and the Leader of the Opposition, providing advice to both and protecting the confidences of both, but answering honestly to each. Those in the usual channels hold the only role in government that means working for both the Government and the Opposition; Roy managed the Whips Offices for both. The British public see adversarial politics and parties in this Chamber, but for decades, Roy and his teams organised and co-ordinated legislation, debates, recesses, statements and urgent questions and managed the relationship between the parties. Woe betide any Chief Whip who tried to change Roy’s recess schedule, which was almost always in tandem with the Kent school holiday breaks.

Every political science course in the country should have dedicated modules on the usual channels and Sir Roy Stone. Roy’s dominance of this behind-the-scenes role made him one of the most impactful and consequential civil servants of his time. Despite being fair to all sides, he was political to his core, not least during the hung Parliament and Brexit. During that time, he was passionate about and focused on supporting the Government to deliver on the referendum, and was increasingly frustrated with us politicians, and in particular me, for failing to deliver a meaningful vote.

Roy loved his central role in this place, and had the respect, if not always the agreement, of everyone, politician and civil servant alike. Despite all the stresses and strains in that most demanding period of parliamentary history, which is when I worked with him, what shone out was the love for and commitment to his family: his brother, who was ill with cancer during the Brexit years; and his wife Dawn and children Hannah and Elliott. In particular, there was pride in Elliott’s commitment to the RAF, in which he was a cadet, and of which he is now a full-time member. A patriot at work, a patriot at home. Rest in peace, Sir Roy Stone.

[Sir Gavin Williamson (Stone, Great Wyrley and Penkridge) (Con)]

Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. Roy was political to his core. He loved this place more than anyone could possibly imagine. He regularly got quite frustrated with Governments and Prime Ministers. I will always remember arriving at the office on my first day as Chief Whip, and seeing his look of frustration and irritation, which said, “Who on earth have they sent me now? He’s never been in the Whips Office.”

I remember Roy sitting me down and explaining that he worked for me 51% of the time and for the Opposition the other 49%. I wanted him to shift the dial a little more in my favour, but he was never going to do that. I asked him, rather naively, what I should read, and whether it was worth picking up “Erskine May”. He looked at me and said, “Chief, only strange people and Clerks read ‘Erskine May’.” Yet there was a not a page in “Erskine May” that he did not know.

Roy started as an apprentice in the Ministry of Defence, worked his way through to No. 10 Downing Street and got briefings ready for Prime Ministers, and then went into the Whips Office. All that equipped him to understand raw politics. As anyone who has been Chief Whip will know, it is deputies, not Chief Whips, who whip their party; Chief Whips have to manage the Prime Minister and the Cabinet. They are there to save the Government from doing incredibly stupid things to themselves every single day—or that was the case in my day. I have a feeling that might not have changed that much.

I would sometimes come into the office and Roy’s eyes would roll; he had heard the news about the latest decision emanating from No. 10. Yet he would always sit down, talk through the problem and give solutions—a potential way out of the awful mess that you found yourself in. I particularly recall the day after the 2017 general election. For those who were not here, it had not gone quite as well as we had hoped. I arrived at the beautiful Chief Whips Office in Downing Street and Roy, who was as good with his Anglo-Saxon words as any man—I will not say the word he used, but it rhymed with “clucking”—said, “Well, you clucking screwed that one up, didn’t you? What are you going to do?” At the time, the Prime Minister was in shock and not really doing an awful lot, and it fell to the Whips Office to work out how we took things forward. Sitting down with Roy to work things out was essential to our putting together a deal with the Democratic Unionist party—a deal that made sure that the right hon. Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) did not have the opportunity to form a Government in 2017, or since.

Roy lived and breathed politics, but also cared about nothing more than his family. I would hear him talk with such pride about his daughter at university, and about his son, whom he took to countless events related to swimming, and then to the RAF. Altogether, Roy was a good friend. Just a few weeks ago, I was sitting down with him, having a cup of coffee and talking about his family. We talked about the difficult times, but also the amazing times. He will be so missed.

Employment Law (Businesses)

Debate between Julian Smith and Gavin Williamson

Wednesday 3rd November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Julian Smith (Skipton and Ripon) (Con)]

I am delighted to have secured this debate on the effect on businesses of proposed changes in employment law. I am particularly delighted that it will be conducted under your chairmanship, Mr Speaker, as I still have my L-plates on: this is only my second speech to Parliament.

When I was a small business owner, dealing with employment law took more time than any other management responsibility—literally hundreds of hours. Since the election of the Labour Government in 1997, employment laws and regulations, ranging from enhanced maternity and paternity rights to the minimum wage, have been piled on to British business. For the employer, particularly for the many small to medium-sized businesses that create the majority of jobs in my constituency, that has meant major additional cost in both time and money. The intense focus on employee rights has ended up with the employer spending a huge amount of time ensuring that he is abiding by the law; it has made him wary of the consequences of even the most innocent error.

Under the previous Government the cumulative effect of employment law was to change the playing field fundamentally, leaving employers feeling defensive rather than confident about hiring people and managing their staff. I remember, a few years ago, having a quiet chat with a young member of my staff who had been playing on the internet for days on end. The following day, I had a call from her mother saying that if I did not follow correct disciplinary procedures the family barrister would be in touch. The quiet chat and the informal word of warning became formalised under Labour. Employment became a transaction.

Even John Hutton, the former Business Secretary, admitted that things had gone too far. In 2008, he said:

“Exercising the right to work ultimately depends on getting the right balance in employment law. Having a multiplicity of employment rights won’t amount to a great deal if you can’t get a job in the first place.”

[Gavin Williamson (South Staffordshire) (Con)]

Having employed people in the past, I know that there is often a real fear of taking on new staff because if one does not get it right first time, the consequences of trying to get rid of a member of staff can be costly to the business. Does my hon. Friend agree that this puts lots of small and medium-sized businesses off expanding?

[Julian Smith]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. A close friend of mine is starting a new business and she told me the other day that her business adviser suggested she should hire people on short-term contracts to avoid the pitfalls of having permanent staff. At the key moment when we need hundreds of thousands of new jobs, the advice to a budding entrepreneur is to avoid permanent staff if they can.

According to the World Bank’s “Doing Business” report, employing workers in the UK has become harder every year since 2007. The report shows that UK labour market flexibility has slipped down the international league table from 17th in 2007 to 35th in 2010. The UK is now behind many European countries, including Switzerland and Denmark, as well as Australia, Canada, the United States and others, on labour market flexibility.

Even those figures do not take into account the effect on small businesses of the sheer worry about these burdens or of the realities of a world in which Britain will be under increasing pressure to compete for internationally mobile business jobs. Small business owners worry about this stuff. That is why they are good at what they do—because they are worriers. By putting so many worries and concerns around the key assets of their business—staff and people—Governments have forced them to spend less time on their businesses. Tom Bannister, who runs the Coniston hotel near Skipton, does not have an HR department, so each employment change that comes from this House takes him away from running his hotel and outdoor centre. We need hard-pressed owner-managers such as Tom to be lying in bed at night worrying about things like the spa development he is currently considering rather than whether they have dealt adequately with the “protected characteristics” of their employees as determined by the Equalities Act 2010.