Important Public Services (Border Security) Regulations 2017

Lord Prior of Brampton Excerpts

Tuesday 24th January 2017 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Prior of Brampton]

That the draft Regulations laid before the House on 5 December be approved.

Relevant document: 20th Report from the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Lord Prior of Brampton) (Con)]

My Lords, the Trade Union Act modernises the UK’s industrial relations framework to better support an effective and collaborative approach to resolving industrial disputes. The Act restores a level of fairness to our industrial relations regime and gives effect to the Government’s manifesto commitments. It ensures that strikes can happen only as a result of a clear, positive decision by those entitled to vote, balancing the interests of unions with the interests of the majority of people who rely on important public services. The Act is not about removing rights. Indeed, the Prime Minister in her recent speech on Brexit made it clear that as we leave the European Union and translate the body of European law into our domestic regulations,

“we will ensure that workers’ rights are fully protected and maintained”.

The Act received Royal Assent in May 2016. Today we are debating six statutory instruments, the first five of which implement a 40% threshold for ballot mandate approval for key public service sectors. This means that as well as there being a requirement that 50% of union members who are eligible to vote do so, 40% of all eligible members will have to be in agreement with the proposed mandate. The sixth statutory instrument that we are debating today will set a 12-month transition period before new provisions for political funds come into force. These provisions will allow new union members to opt in to any political fund supported by their union, rather than any such subscription being automatic. The 12-month transition period will allow unions to make the necessary system and rule changes.

We propose that the 40% threshold and the transition period come into force on 1 March. We will also make a commencement order to ensure that Section 11 of the Trade Union Act is brought fully into force on that date. At the same time, we will bring into force a number of other provisions in the Trade Union Act. As I have mentioned, these include a 50% threshold for those eligible to vote to do so as well as additional information about the result of any ballot, two weeks’ notice of industrial action to be given to employers, new requirements to manage picketing, and reporting on industrial action and political fund expenditure. This ensures that the key changes to the way official industrial action is decided on and implemented are prioritised and come into effect as a single package.

The purpose of the ballot thresholds is to rebalance the ability of union members to strike with the interests of the general public, non-striking workers and employers. The Trade Union Act takes proportionate action to redress the balance and ensure that unions in these sectors have a strong democratic mandate before they take strike action.

The impact of strike action is most severe when it takes place in the important public services that people and businesses rely on every day, particularly where it leaves people with no real alternatives when strikes take place. This is particularly unfair when strike action goes ahead without strong support by a unionised workforce. This is why we have introduced an additional 40% approval threshold to apply to important public services such as health and rail transport, in addition to a requirement for a 50% turnout threshold. This is a robust threshold, and rightly so. It is in the interest of the public to know that where they face disruption in these crucial services as a result of strike action, this is because union members have secured a strong democratic mandate. This is also important for union members who were not in support of strike action. I know that some noble Lords have expressed concerns that these reforms do not go far enough. The Government believe that the measures they are putting in place strike the right balance.

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One just has to look at USDAW, which has put a very detailed case together to show how it may be able to implement these regulations within a proper timeframe. It falls outside these provisions. Unfortunately, I do not understand how the Government came to the view that this was how to implement the Trade Union Act. I hope the Minister is able to address these issues because I am sure that things can be done. It is certainly possible to direct the CO to look at different ways forward and to put a schedule together that identifies when unions will adequately be able to cover their obligations while following the rules. It is possible to do this using measures that can supersede or overlay the statutory instruments. I will be very grateful if the Minister can give us an undertaking tonight that he will not put unions in such an invidious position.

[Lord Prior of Brampton]

My Lords, I am not sure if I regret not being in the Chamber when this was originally discussed, but I would have been in a better position to address some of the issues raised if I had. Reading Hansard you do not quite get a sense of the very strong feelings of noble Lords. As it was almost an empty Chamber when I arrived tonight, I thought I might get off rather more easily than I have.

I completely agree with much of what the noble Lord, Lord Mendelsohn, said at the beginning of his speech. When you have difficult industrial relations in companies or sectors, it is very often not just the fault of the trade unions but of poor management, poor contracts and the like. I completely understand that.

I think the noble Lord, Lord Monks, said that an easy way of appeasing Conservative associations is to bring in hostile trade union legislation. I think we have moved on as a party and are now more enlightened. One noble Lord also said this was a debate about nostalgia; that may be so if you look back at the Conservative Party through the eyes of the Labour Party. We may have set ourselves up to be against trade unions but I agree with the Prime Minister that we are not against workers’ rights. On the contrary, the whole thrust of our industrial strategy is to provide decent, well-paid jobs for people throughout the country.

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[Lord Prior of Brampton]

One cannot accept the recommendations until one has seen them. We will look at the review and make up our minds on which parts of it to implement. We cannot give any guarantees now to implement it.

As I said, I shall resist the temptation to get into a debate about the funding of political parties. That is for another time. We have had a debate before about the main issues in the Bill and there is no purpose in going much beyond what I said in my opening speech about the Government’s view. I explained the purpose of the 40% ballot threshold regulations—to rebalance the ability to strike of union members in the health, fire, education, transport and border force sectors with the interests of the general public. That is quite a significant limitation. We have tried to draw the distinctions carefully. I take the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Monks, about the definitional issues; we have tried to be as clear as we can in that regard.

We have also taken a proportionate approach in relation to the political funds opt-out in transition periods. It is reasonable to say that the trade unions knew back in May that we would be going for a transitional period, and 12 months was stated as a reasonable period by the Lords Select Committee. The unions have a way of avoiding the need to hold conferences, through Section 92 of the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act if they wish to use it. I do not think 12 months is unreasonable: in the Conservative manifesto it was actually three months. I imagine that some noble Lords on the other side of the House were surprised by the Government’s response to the Select Committee’s recommendations. As the noble Lord, Lord Kerslake, said, it was a fair package and that was also the view of the noble Lord, Lord Burns. We have taken a proportionate approach to the political funds opt-in transition period regulations. We took on board the very helpful recommendations of the Select Committee, and these regulations provide for a 12-month transition period for implementation.

[Lord Whitty]

Just to be clear, the Select Committee recommended a minimum of 12 months, subject to a consultation. The noble Lord has now had the consultation, the burden of which is that we need longer than that if we are starting in March. So he is at odds with what the Select Committee intended.

[Lord Prior of Brampton]

We did have a consultation, and it is true to say that our views and those of some of the trade unions were different. We do have a different view: I think the trade unions would like a longer period. But our feeling was that 12 months was a reasonable period.

The regulations support the Government’s commitment to delivering a modernised industrial relations framework to better support an effective and collaborative approach for resolving industrial disputes. I believe they are fair and appropriate, and I commend them to noble Lords.

Motion agreed.