Employment Rights Bill

Baroness Coffey Excerpts

2nd reading
Thursday 27th March 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Coffey (Con)]

My Lords, I congratulate my noble friends. I will start with the noble Baroness, Lady Cash, who I have known for 35 years from when we were students together. She was elegant and eloquent then, and that will continue. I am also looking forward to my noble friend Lord Young of Acton, as I am sure he will spice things up if we are to judge by some of his past publications. I extend my congratulations to the noble Baronesses, Lady Berger and Lady Gray of Tottenham. Without destroying their reputations in this House, I consider them to be friends, having come into the House together with them and worked with the noble Baroness, Lady Gray, in government too. I am sure that they will continue to staunchly uphold their principles as well as contributing to national debate.

In terms of national debate, this Employment Rights Bill entered the other House 100 days into this Government with 149 pages. After Committee in the other place, there were 191 pages, and now there are 299 pages, which it will be generous to get through in seven days of Committee consideration. Today, I want to focus on just a handful.

On Clause 59 relating to union finances, I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Burns. I do not understand the trend, with all the consumer and legislation protection that we put in place, for encouraging people to have to opt in to contractual arrangements. The default now by and large is that you are automatically opted out. I believe that should be continued, especially when there is a section in the legislation which suggests that union members who have not opted out should be reminded only every 10 years that they have the opportunity to do so.

On small businesses, I know the FSB is particularly concerned about two matters: the day-one risk of taking people on with there being no statutory probation period yet in law, and statutory sick pay. It used to be the case that SSP was rebated to all employers. I know that because when I worked at Mars, I used to fill out the forms every year to get the refund. However, that got taken away, recognising some of the improvements to be made in occupational health. It is important that the Government reconsider that with this shift to day-one rights, or at least produce an impact assessment.

On getting automatic rights on day one of employment and unfair dismissal, this already applies through the Equality Act. There is consideration of people with disabilities and other protected characteristics. I support the Government’s measures for a right to try in getting people a job, but perhaps the same should apply to employers. They have a right to try out employees and the statutory notice period should be put in the Bill and not left to regulations.

It is important that we continue the work of the occupational health task force to make sure that we have positive arrangements in place so that people can start, stay and succeed in work, but we need to remove the uncertainty, because I fear that companies will simply choose not to grow. I know that from my experience in Suffolk and some of the flexible working practices there. I understand why the Labour Government have chosen to put even more controls on them, but without the support of small businesses we will not get growth in productivity and, indeed, economic growth more generally.

On the fair work agency, I welcome the construction of this combination of regulators—it is a sensible approach—but I consider Clause 113 to be novel. When I asked the Minister in the other House, Justin Madders, he seemed to suggest that the EHRC had similar powers. The Equality Act actually gives the same powers as Clause 114, under which legal assistance can be provided, including advice, representation and other forms of assistance, but not the situation where the fair work agency could take a case on behalf of a worker, or somebody who has applied for a job and is not even a worker. Subsection (6) removes any liability from the Secretary of State towards that same worker. Of course there will be a need to recover legal costs from the worker. I understand that, if there is a big payout, the Government may want to recover the funds that they have given out, but the regulations need to change to the affirmative rather than the negative procedure. In Clause 114, who will get the money to take people’s cases to court? Will it be the unions or a bunch of law firms? That does not feel like the approach we should be taking with taxpayers’ money, although it admittedly strengthens rights.

I should say to the Government that I have nothing against trade unions; I actively encourage people to join them. They can play a valuable role. I have never felt the need to join one myself, although it is in my blood: I looked at the 1921 census and my grandfather was an apprentice shipbuilder. It was also noted in the census that he was on strike, so it certainly runs through the Coffey veins. Indeed, other people were trade union organisers. But we need to be careful that we do not end up destroying growth rather than promoting it.