Leaving the EU: Workers’ Rights

Laura Pidcock Excerpts

Tuesday 29th October 2019 Commons Chamber

[Laura Pidcock (North West Durham) (Lab)]

(Urgent question): To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy if she will make a statement on the Government’s plans for workers’ rights after the UK leaves the EU.

[The Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Andrea Leadsom)]

The UK has a long and proud tradition of leading the way in workers’ rights and for setting the highest standards. The Government have been clear and consistent that the decision to leave the EU does not change that in any way whatever. The Government have absolutely no intention of lowering standards on workers’ rights. To suggest otherwise is scaremongering and is untrue.

The EU has traditionally set minimum standards for workers’ rights and, as all colleagues in this Chamber would expect, the UK already exceeds standards in a wide range of areas, such as maternity and paternity leave and pay. The UK offers 39 weeks of statutory maternity pay, compared with the 14 weeks of paid maternity leave required by the EU’s minimum standards. Because the Government believe in the importance of supporting families in every possible way, we have also given fathers and partners an additional statutory right to leave and pay, something that the EU is only now starting to consider. We are one of the few EU member states to have introduced shared parental leave and we are proud that in the UK we have given all employees with 26 weeks qualifying service a statutory right to request flexible working that enables so many to better balance work and life responsibilities. EU law only allows workers to make such a request if returning from parental leave.

Under the terms of the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018, all existing workers’ rights laws will be transferred into domestic law once we have left the EU, making sure there is no gap or lack of clarity in the minimum set of workers’ rights which, as I have already said, the UK exceeds in many areas. We are also including in the Withdrawal Agreement Bill a new requirement that every Bill brought before this place in the future that affects workers’ rights will include a statement by the Government of the day on how it impacts workers’ rights. This will ensure that Parliament always has its say. The Government have also published clauses that will require every Government, now and in the future, to monitor new EU legislation covering employment and workplace health and safety standards, and to report on those changes to Parliament so that Parliament can again have its say.

In direct answer to the hon. Lady’s question, I can absolutely assure her and this House that the Government will not lower standards on workers’ rights when we leave the EU. On the contrary, it is the ambition of this Government to make the United Kingdom the best place to work and to grow a business.

[Laura Pidcock]

Thank you for granting this urgent question, Mr Speaker. I persisted.

The leaked memos reported in the Financial Times over the weekend are both worrying and, at the same time, utterly predictable. They shine a light on the true politics of this Conservative Government and how they are seeking to use the withdrawal agreement Bill, as with their whole Brexit strategy, to sell out workers. The Prime Minister may keep repeating that it is an excellent deal, and no doubt that will be the mantra come a general election, but I would like to get to the truth. I want to start by asking the Secretary of State about the status of the documents, and particularly which Government Departments they were distributed to and when. At what stage was the Secretary of State aware of their existence and their content? If she was not aware, why not?

This issue is critical given that last week the Government gave a number of assurances on this issue to Members in this House, while at the same time they were seemingly discussing the very opposite among themselves. They will use Brexit as a blueprint for rapid deregulation, which will see the vital floor on protections disappear. This Government have proposed a Brexit deal that benefits their pals—the millionaires, the speculators and hedge fund managers—over working people. [Interruption.] Government Members can shout at me all they want, but that is the truth. How can we trust a Prime Minister who stood up and said they would keep the “highest possible standards” on workers’ rights, when the leaks show that the Government view such commitments as “inappropriate” and that negotiators had “successfully resisted” them being included in the legally binding part of the agreement with the EU? These rights are not inappropriate; they include things such as maternity leave, working hours, paid holiday leave—things that make a difference in people’s lives.

The Secretary of State says that the Government do not intend to dilute rights after we leave the EU. May I then ask her very simply: why did they take level playing field obligations out of the legally binding part of their Brexit agreement? Crucially, has the Secretary of State’s Department or the Cabinet Office ever looked at deregulation? If so, why? We need to get to the bottom of this. The Government are relying on the complexity of the legislation to bury their true approach to workers’ rights. Once we expose exactly the consequences of their approach to leaving the EU and what it means for our communities, they know that the Government could never win support of this House and, more importantly, of working people. Rather than resisting workers’ rights, we need a fundamental shift in power from the owners of business to workers. It is only a Labour Government who will ever do that.

[Andrea Leadsom]

Well, Mr Speaker, that was incredibly disappointing. The hon. Lady obviously was not listening to a thing I said. If she will allow me, I will just repeat what I actually said, rather than what she asserts I said. It is this Government’s ambition to make the United Kingdom the best place in the world to work.

I find it extraordinary that the hon. Lady thinks that the only valid protector of UK workers’ rights can be the European Union. Why on earth does she think that her party, my party, the other Opposition parties and our strong trade union tradition in the UK are utterly incapable of building on the superb tradition we already have in the UK of exceeding workers’ rights in the EU in so many areas? Once we have left the European Union, the United Kingdom will not be represented in EU institutions and nor will we have any direct influence on future EU legislation on workers’ rights. Why then should the Government and this Parliament seek to engineer circumstances where we are required to implement legislation over which we have had no say?

As we leave the European Union, we have a unique opportunity to enhance protections for the workforce and tailor them to best support UK workers. It will be for the United Kingdom to create and enhance UK employment rights and to take advantage of the superb opportunities for new UK-wide skills, jobs and prosperity that await us after we have left the European Union.