Employment Rights Bill

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 13th May 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hogan-Howe (CB)]

My Lords, my amendment is supported by the noble Lords, Lord Paddick and Lord Evans, for which I am grateful. The amendment seeks to add special constables to the group of people in the criminal justice system who have the right to time off to fulfil their duties.

In 2018, Section 50 of the Employment Act was amended to include lay observers in prisons and members of immigration visiting committees for immigration centres and short-term holding facilities among those, such as magistrates and JPs, who have the right to take time off from their employment. Of course, each of those groups of volunteers is essential to the effective functioning of the criminal justice system, and so are special constables, who have existed since being created by the Special Constables Act 1831, although today’s version was really created by the Police Act 1964.

Special constables are special by name and special by nature, in my view. They are unpaid volunteers who have all the powers of a regular constable and take all the risks that their colleagues take, too, of being stabbed, assaulted and people abusing or spitting at them. They are paid expenses, but of course this covers only their outgoings and they make no profit. They deal with issues such as suicides, terrible road traffic collisions and many other things that regular officers have to deal with, but these are volunteers. After being trained, they are usually expected to be on duty for at least four hours a month. Most do very much more than that; some work every weekend. During breaks in employment, they often work almost full-time hours. Some work at this for over 20 years.

Special constables were designed to be a contingency for war, backfilling the police officers who would be expected to join the Armed Forces. Given many of the uncertainties in the world at the moment, it is not unrealistic to expect that we may call on them in the foreseeable future.

Special constables are a visible representation of community policing, giving of themselves without payment to stop crime and keep order. For me, they have always been a way to have the community in the police station, holding their regular colleagues to account and not captured by the prevalent police culture of the time—almost a pre-body-worn video system before that was even thought about. Some 25% of them go on to become regular officers, so it is not a bad recruiting route and not a bad way for them to test whether they would like to be a police officer or whether police officers think that they are going to be suitable full-time colleagues in future.

At present, the numbers of special constables are dropping quite dramatically. In September 2023, there were 6,330 in England and Wales, but by September the following year there were only 5,818. That is just one-third of the figure it was 10 years ago.

In this context, on the grounds of equity with other volunteers in the criminal justice system, surely we need to enhance the volunteer offer to encourage recruitment, retention and diversity. The Government have said that they want strategically to boost neighbourhood policing, with around 13,000 more officers and PCSOs in the coming years. Surely that priority alone demands that special constables—the most visible of community-based policing—have a priority in recruitment. This amendment would assist in that process.

No doubt the Government may say that this should not be approached in a piecemeal way and that they will make announcements when they say more about neighbourhood policing. Many of those announcements have been made, and this opportunity has been missed, I would say.

Some may say that this is a burden on small businesses, but I do not accept that. The Section 50 right for volunteers has a reasonableness clause in it, so a business of three people may struggle to give any time off, whereas a business employing 10,000 people may have far more flexibility. For example, it is not reasonable for an employee to consistently take time off when the business is particularly busy and needs them.

To be fair, those people come back to work better trained, confident and rounded individuals. As I said earlier, they have had a few new experiences of life—some good and some not so good. The Government may say that, if we do that for this group of volunteers, we may have to do it for others, and we may need to consider that as a whole. I do not accept that either; this reform is long overdue and is supported by the National Police Chiefs’ Council and the specials’ own representative body, the Association of Special Constabulary Officers.

There is a huge gap in recruitment and retention, and that problem is now and the time to deal with it is now. This is a great opportunity to assist what is a special group of people whom we probably have all taken for granted for too long. The Government have an opportunity in this Bill to do something to help, and which will cost nothing.

[Lord Paddick (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I rise to support Amendment 82 in the name of my friend and former colleague, the noble Lord Hogan-Howe, which I have signed. I declare an interest as a paid non-executive adviser to the Metropolitan Police Service. I apologise that I was unable to speak at Second Reading, but I intend to focus in a disciplined way on the amendment, unlike some colleagues.

In London, the Metropolitan Police, the UK’s largest police force, has, in recent years, been unable to recruit police officers to the level it has been funded for, and is now unable to recruit full-time regular police officers because of budget constraints. The Labour Government’s community policing guarantee, to recruit 13,000 more neighbourhood police and Police Community Support Officers, appears to be challenging, given that the Metropolitan Police accounts for about 19% of all UK police officers and about 25% of the UK police budget.

One low-cost way to recruit more community police officers is to take a no-cost-to-the-taxpayer measure to encourage members of the public to become special constables, such as that proposed in the noble Lord’s amendment. As of March 2023, the contribution of special constables was saving an estimated £85 million to £90 million a year in policing delivery, according to government statistics.

The Minister may well say, as Ministers are prone to do—for example, on the issue of humanist weddings—that while they agree in principle with the amendment it needs to be part of a holistic approach to volunteering generally; that the Government will consider this and bring forward such legislation in due course, if necessary; but that they do not want to create an uneven playing field. However, if they intend to meet the 13,000 uplift in community police officers, they need to create an uneven playing field, providing more of an incentive for the public to volunteer to be special constables than to be any other sort of volunteer.

In any event, the playing field is already uneven, as the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, has just said, in that in 2018 the Government—albeit a different Government—amended Section 50 of the Employment Rights Act 1996 to include four groups of volunteers in another part of the criminal justice system, such as independent prison monitors. The reason was to attract applicants in full-time employment, who tend to be younger, and thereby improve the diversity of these volunteers, who tended to be skewed in favour of older age groups.

Not only do the police need fit, younger people to volunteer to be special constables but, particularly in London, they need local volunteers who know and reflect the diversity of the communities in which they will serve. The proportion of special constables from minority backgrounds currently serving is higher than it is among regular full-time police officers, and with the added incentive that this amendment would provide, we have the prospect of recruiting more ideal volunteers, who know and reflect their local communities, as special constables.

Were these not good enough reasons to support this amendment, given the current issues around police culture—highlighted by the noble Baroness, Lady Casey of Blackstock, in her report on the cultural issues facing the Metropolitan Police—recruiting more officers from minority backgrounds, working part-time and hence less influenced by existing negative aspects of police culture, would assist in changing those undesirable aspects of police culture and increase public trust and confidence. Not only would the public see more police officers who look like them; they may recognise them as members of their local community.

The special constabulary has also proved to be a fertile recruiting ground for the full-time regular force, as the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, has just said, providing an opportunity for those from minority backgrounds in particular to try out policing before making a full-time commitment to it. Recruiting more volunteer special constables could also lead to improving the diversity and local representation among the full-time regular police force.

As with the changes made in 2018 to the 1996 Act, there are compelling reasons to extend Section 50 of the current Employment Rights Act to special constables, and I enthusiastically support this amendment.

[Lord Fox (LD)]

My Lords, we could hardly have expected two more expert speakers to propose this amendment. This is another case where society is getting something on the cheap and, even though it is a different argument from the one about unpaid carers, it is another way where, in fact, we are not recognising the value that society is getting from these people who work as special police officers.

I really want to hear what the Government say on this and I hope it is not the sort of answer that my friend, the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, suggested it might be but is something rather more constructive that can come forward the next time this Bill comes up.

Employment Rights Bill

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 18th June 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hamwee (LD)]

My Lords, Amendment 273P is a real-world amendment, to echo my noble friend. I am very conscious that I have a single amendment to this Bill, that others have laboured into what is day 10, I think, and that noble Lords are waiting for the important discussion on the Casey review, so I will try to be almost telegraphic.

This amendment is about a firewall, with the objective of protecting workers who are in great need of protection, so it is squarely within the fair work agency’s client base, if you like. The firewall would restrict the disclosure for use for immigration purposes of information about someone who has suffered or witnessed labour abuse. That may sound counterintuitive: surely these are people about whom all the agencies of the state should have information. In the case of migrant workers, the situation is not so straightforward. It was during the passage of the Modern Slavery Act 2015 that I first heard about the conditions in which some overseas domestic workers existed—I use that term rather than “lived”. Slavery was the right term. A change in the rules was made, but it was minor and quite inadequate. Our law did not and does not protect them and all migrant workers as it should.

Migrant workers, not only overseas domestic workers, are particularly vulnerable to exploitation and abuse, not just because of the consequences if their existence comes to the attention of immigration authorities but because of their fear of the consequences. If you do not know your way around the system, you are on the wrong side of the power balance with an unscrupulous employer who can threaten that you will be detained or deported, or that you will have your children taken away, so you cannot take the risk of reporting abuse and exploitation to anyone in authority.

I understand that that fear is well founded. I am told by the sector that evidence indicates that data is often shared between labour market enforcement agencies, the police and immigration enforcement. They have no obligation to share, but they do. In a way, that is not surprising; they have their own jobs to do. I am not surprised, because I have a long history of opposition to paragraph 4 of Schedule 2 to the Data Protection Act, which allows that sharing—opposition with which someone who is now in a very high place in the current Government became associated and led the troops into the right Lobby.

The current situation has a widespread effect. It fosters mistrust of migrant communities, prevents the police and labour inspectors doing their jobs properly, and drives down conditions for all workers. Secure reporting has been implemented elsewhere, including in the Netherlands and in Spain, and I am pleased to say that Surrey Police has implemented a firewall and the Greater London Authority is undertaking a pilot. Had I more time, I would explain the detail.

Secure reporting mechanisms are badly needed in many sectors, such as agriculture, health, social care, cleaning and domestic work. Your immigration status should not mean that you should not have access to safe, decent working conditions and be protected against abuse and exploitation. I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Watson of Invergowrie, and the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of London, who have signed my amendment, as has my noble friend Lord Paddick. In turn, I have signed his two amendments in this group. They are probing amendments. They are hugely important because they seek to ensure that the fair work agency, which is not a legal entity but will be an agency of the Department for Business and Trade created administratively, can carry out all the powers and functions of the GLAA, or that somebody does, because what the GLAA is able to do in this area must not slip out of the legislative framework. I beg to move.

[Lord Paddick (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I will speak to Amendments 279ZA and 279ZB, which are in my name and that of my friend, the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee. Before I speak to them, I will say how much I support her Amendment 273PA.

My amendments are probing amendments, as the noble Baroness just said, to seek reassurances from the Minister that the fair work agency will have the capacity and focus to maintain the safeguards provided by the Modern Slavery Act that are currently undertaken by the Gangmasters and Labour Abuse Authority—the GLAA. I am grateful to Dame Sara Thornton, a former Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner, and her colleagues at the University of Nottingham and Nottingham Trent University for highlighting these issues.

The GLAA has two important responsibilities under the Modern Slavery Act in this context: it is a first responder referring victims of modern slavery into the national referral mechanism, and it has a duty to notify the Secretary of State for the Home Department in cases where victims of modern slavery refuse to be referred, to ensure that the Home Office has a comprehensive understanding of the nature and extent of modern slavery and those affected by it. My understanding is that, under this Bill, the GLAA will be abolished and its responsibilities will be taken over by the fair work agency, but it is not clear from the legislation whether the GLAA’s first responder status and duty to notify will also be transferred, or whether amendments such as those proposed are necessary to ensure that those important responsibilities and duties are carried out by the fair work agency once the GLAA is abolished.

In addition, the GLAA is focused on protecting vulnerable and exploited workers and on illegal activities such as human trafficking, forced labour and illegal labour provision, whereas the fair work agency will have a much wider remit, including what is currently in HMRC’s national minimum wage unit and the Employment Agency Standards Inspectorate. Staff expertise in modern slavery may be lost, and if the fair work agency is not adequately resourced, the emphasis is likely to be on compliance rather than enforcement. By ensuring that the fair work agency has first responder status and a duty to notify, it is more likely to retain its level of expertise in modern slavery.

Under Section 43 of the Modern Slavery Act 2015, the GLAA has a duty to co-operate with the Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner, enabling the commissioner to access unpublished information that assists in understanding and responding to modern slavery in the UK. Again, it is unclear whether the fair work agency will also have a statutory duty to co-operate with the Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner in the same way as the GLAA, which it is replacing. The second amendment would make that duty explicit.

Can the Minister reassure the Committee that the focus on modern slavery is not being lost or diluted by the absorption of the Gangmasters and Labour Abuse Authority into the fair work agency, either through a lack of resources or a lack of expertise, and that the GLAA’s statutory responsibilities as a first responder, its duty to notify and its duty to co-operate with the Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner will not be lost or diluted as a result of these changes? I look forward to the Minister’s response.