Gangmasters Licensing Authority (Civil Fines)

Philip Hollobone Excerpts

Tuesday 11th June 2013 Westminster Hall

[Mr Heath]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. I do not have the figures with me and will, therefore, happily write to him to set out the position.

I will, in fact, go further than that. I am due in East Anglia tomorrow and I plan to meet with the GLA to discuss exactly how it operates and how we can help it to operate, so it seems entirely appropriate that we look at the resourcing issues. It is not small beer to redirect resources from areas where they are deployed to no great benefit because they are being used to license people who have not the slightest intention of breaking the law, and have the track record to show that they do not. It seems entirely appropriate to redirect the resource to deal with the bad guys, against whom we need to collect evidence.

I take the point about the difference between criminal and civil standards of proof. That is, of course, a factor, but let me be absolutely clear: I want more criminal prosecutions. I want to see more people brought before a court for their abuses and I want them then to suffer the further penalty, where appropriate, of proceeds of crime restitution, so that we get back the money that the gangmasters have acquired through illicit means. We also need to make it plain that they are not wanted in our agricultural industry. We must deal with them effectively.

I do not quarrel at all with the hon. Gentleman’s point, but I want to ensure that we do this right, and I am working within an overall Government policy that is resistant to the view that civil sanctions are the appropriate means of dealing with small and medium-sized businesses. That is my difficulty. It is not an insurmountable difficulty, but I need to persuade others in Government of the case.

Some provisions of the RES Act might be useful to the operation of the GLA. We have invited views from stakeholders on the usefulness of the measures, and the public consultation by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs remains open until 21 June. I therefore invite the hon. Gentleman, and others who feel strongly about the matter, to ensure that their views are fed into that consultation process. When we respond to the consultation in due course, it will be helpful for us clearly to understand, from colleagues who represent areas where many labourers work in such schemes, what the problems are and how we should best deal with them.

As I said, I am very happy to look at the matter in the round and to recognise the strength of the arguments, but I come back to my basic premise, from which I will not resile: the key change will be to redirect resources as the GLA is asking us to. That seems to make sense, but obviously we must wait for the consultation process to end to see whether others agree that we should redirect resources in the key areas of serious offences and organised crime.

The GLA itself has been at the forefront of the reform programme, and last week published its three-year strategy for protecting vulnerable workers, which emphasises an intelligence-led, risk-based approach, working closely in partnership with other agencies. The hon. Gentleman will know that the GLA is active in many parts of the country, including in the constituencies of the hon. Gentlemen here today: North East Cambridgeshire, Morecambe and Lunesdale, and Peterborough.

The hon. Member for North East Cambridgeshire mentioned Operation Pheasant, a multi-agency taskforce set up to tackle ongoing worker issues in the area. Three people have been arrested on suspicion of human trafficking offences in Wisbech, and a diverse team of agencies has been assembled to assist with the operation, with partners including Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, the Home Office, trading standards, Fenland district council and Cambridgeshire fire and rescue.

I want to know more about the matter at first hand, which is one of the reasons why I am going to East Anglia tomorrow to talk directly to GLA officers and partner agencies involved in the joint operation. If they tell me that there are clear areas in which we have still not dealt effectively with the issues they want us to address, the hon. Gentleman can be assured that I will act on that and take their advice in developing Government policy.

I believe that the package of reforms that we are taking forward with the GLA will make the authority better able to protect vulnerable workers, while easing burdens on the majority of businesses, which are compliant and law-abiding. I am very grateful to the hon. Gentleman for having given us the opportunity to discuss this extremely important issue.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)]

I suspect that the debate has been the best possible pre-briefing for the Minister’s visit tomorrow.

Question put and agreed to.