Trade Unions: Ballots

Lord Grocott Excerpts

Thursday 31st March 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord De Mauley]

My Lords, I hear what the noble Lord says. I suggest that we have had a fair amount of debate on the subject over recent months and I suspect that more may be occasioned in the future. There is little precedent for thresholds being applied to referendums in the United Kingdom. There was no threshold in the referendums on Scottish and Welsh devolution in 1997, the Belfast agreement or the Greater London Authority in 1998, or in the north-east referendum in 2004. Also, no threshold is specified for mayoral referendums under the Local Government Act, despite very low turnouts having been seen in practice in some cases.

[Lord Grocott]

My Lords, the Question was fundamentally about whether the Government are adopting a consistent position in respect of determining the validity of a decision. Can the Minister simply explain why, when we are changing the constitution of the country, presumably for a very long time, the Government feel that there is no necessity even for the level of a threshold that is required for the recognition of a single trade union? It seems to most people to be a totally contradictory position.

[Lord De Mauley]

My Lords, let me say, if I may be so bold, that that was not what the Question was about. The Question was about union recognition ballots. The Government’s position on that is, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”.