Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, with reference to the oral contribution of the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy of 27 April 2021, Official Report, column 86WH, on the Government's policy on the inappropriate use by some employers of fire and rehire as a negotiation tactic, what steps their Department has taken to (a) investigate and (b) discourage the use of fire and rehire negotiation tactics by their Department's executive non-departmental public bodies; and what steps they have taken to communicate the Government's policy on those practices to those bodies.

Non-departmental public bodies (NDPBs) are not part of the department and operate at arms-length from Ministers. We work constructively with our NDPBs and this includes issues of workforce management but it is ultimately the responsibility of each NDPB to manage their staff. Whilst we have not communicated on this issue with all our NDPBs, the Government has been very clear that threatening fire and rehire as a negotiating tactic is completely unacceptable. We always expect employers to treat employees fairly and in the spirit of partnership working with trade unions, where relevant, constructively. We are confident that all non-departmental public bodies are aware of the Government’s position on this matter.