Blacklisting

Tom Greatrex Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd January 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Umunna]

I agree with my hon. Friend and will expand on that further.

[Tom Greatrex (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (Lab/Co-op)]

My hon. Friend is right not to seek to apportion blame. I know that there were other distractions this morning, so I do not know whether he heard the interview with the Information Commissioner and the astonishing complacency with which he failed to address the fact that progress has been so slow in identifying even the 3,000, let alone others who might have been subject to blacklisting.

[Mr Umunna]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. Overall, although the Information Commissioner has done good work in this area his office needs to be far more proactive in its approach to the overall issue.

The Economic League was wound up in 1993 and its construction company members wanted to continue its activities in their sector, so the Consulting Association was set up. It spun off out of the league in 1993 and a former regional organiser of the league, Mr Ian Kerr, became its chief officer until it was wound up in 2009. Mr Kerr, through the association, ran a large-scale secret operation on behalf of the construction companies, which were all leading companies in the sector. Many of the construction companies have since sought to distance themselves from the association’s activities by claiming, for example, that its services were used by subsidiaries they did not own at the time. Some have simply maintained that none of their managers knew the practice was going on, despite strong evidence to the contrary. Let me be clear: these well-known construction companies were involved in some way, shape or form with the association and therefore with its practices and no amount of carefully worded legal statements, denials or excuses can hide that fact.