Good Work Plan

Rachel Reeves Excerpts

Monday 17th December 2018 Commons Chamber

[Greg Clark]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for his endorsement. The great reforms being made in response to, in this case, a very good report are happening at pace—we are tabling legislation this very day—but he, like me, is sometimes frustrated that the reforms do not get the attention they merit, but he gives me the opportunity to draw the House’s attention to them today.

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right about apprentices. A key part of the industrial strategy is to increase the quality and the number of apprenticeships, to which he has made a distinguished contribution. It is vital that apprentices should be paid what they are due in terms of the minimum wages. We have doubled the enforcement budget for Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, and the measures we have set out—we are working very closely with Sir David Metcalf—will make sure it is clearly understood by every employer that paying the minimum wages, whether for apprentices or others, is not optional but essential if they are to trade in this country.

[Rachel Reeves (Leeds West) (Lab)]

The Select Committees on Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and on Work and Pensions concluded that workers frequently rely on employment tribunals to enforce their rights and recommended punitive fines on employers for breaches of law. The Government are increasing the potential payouts for those who get to tribunal, which I warmly welcome, but they are refusing to reduce tribunal fees. Will the Secretary of State pledge to look at that again? Will the Government listen to Sir David Metcalf, the director of labour market enforcement, who said today that he is disappointed that the Government have rejected his recommendation of greater penalties for non-compliance in paying the minimum wage?

Will the Secretary of State tell us how many more cases need to be won against employers like Uber, Hermes and Addison Lee before the Government act, name and shame and properly punish these businesses that wrongly classify their workers as self-employed and deny them the rights to which they are entitled?

[Greg Clark]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady, the Chair of the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee, for her comments and for welcoming our increase in penalties. It is essential that we send a message that people’s employment rights are non-negotiable and that they must be paid.

We work closely with Sir David Metcalf, a man for whom I have the greatest admiration. The reason for not increasing, at this stage, the penalties available to the authorities for non-compliance with the national minimum wages is that the penalties were increased about 18 months ago. We have not ruled it out, but we have said that we will look at the effect of the increase and consider it.

The hon. Lady will be aware that a big increase in penalties for employers that persistently breach the verdicts of employment tribunals would be very welcome. Again, we will keep under review the employment tribunals regime to make sure that people have access to the justice they need, but when her Committee considers its response to the report I hope it will agree and endorse what is a substantial package that, in many ways and in many respects, goes beyond what was proposed both by Matthew Taylor, important though his contribution has been, and by the Committee. We have gone further than many people expected, which is quite right given the importance of employment rights in this country.