Employment Rights Bill

Baroness Barran Excerpts

Consideration of Commons amendments and / or reasons
Tuesday 28th October 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

My Lords, I feel in a lonely position in not being able to thank the Government for their comments on my amendment. I feel sad that I have to speak again, as I hoped that the Government would have talked to those running our schools and trusts and would have adjusted their approach. They clearly have not done that, so we are here again.

I feel slightly sorry for the Minister, because the remarks he was given about my amendment were—if I may say so—ill-advised. It is disingenuous to suggest that my amendment would have facilitated contracts where someone was offered a free lunch and then paid below the minimum wage. There is absolutely nothing in my amendment that suggests that, and both the Minister in the Department for Education and his predecessor, the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, whom I met at the end of July, were very clear that there was nothing at all like that. I will also challenge some of the other remarks that he made, but there is nothing in my amendment that would worsen the terms for employees. It is therefore unfortunate that that was the advice he was given on how to approach this.

Before I come to my Motion, I remind noble Lords, by way of context, that this is—unlike heritage railways, with the greatest respect to my noble friend—a big issue. There are 800,000 support staff in our schools and about half a million full-time equivalent employees. Half of them are teaching assistants and the other half are in a multiplicity—literally thousands—of different roles, so when the noble Lord says that this is not a top-down approach, my jaw hits the ground. The idea that the SSSNB is going to be able to create a full range of role profiles, pay scales, et cetera, is just not realistic. We are going to end up with either a labyrinth or a straitjacket, and neither, I would suggest, is an ideal outcome. Despite me having raised this at every stage of the Bill, the Government have not explained how they will address the multiplicity of roles that exist. When the SSSNB was in existence previously, before 2010, we did not have about 2,500 trusts of different sizes and geographic footprints, organised differently with various roles within them.

The amendment also does not address the inconsistency in the Government’s approach between the schoolteachers’ pay and review body and the SSSNB. In the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill, the Government accepted the principle of a framework that academies must have regard to. In Schedule 3 to the schools Bill, it says that academies

“must have regard to any provision of an order under section 122 that relates to conditions of employment”.

It goes on to say that they

“must also have regard to guidance”.

We tried to bring in an identical amendment on Report—my Amendment 111A—which mirrored the Government’s own amendment to the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill, but, at the time, the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, argued that it would be wrong to create a two-tier system. We actually have a two-tier system for teachers in maintained schools and in academies, but we are rejecting a system, proposed through my amendment, which would offer only upside to school support staff, so that we end up with a triumph of uniformity over innovation.

My Motion N1 aims to give the Government a practical way to deliver their objectives of consistency and fairness, without unduly constraining the judgment of school and trust leaders in managing their workforce. Without this amendment, employers in academies and maintained schools will lose their ability to design contracts which meet the needs of both the workforce and their pupils. That might include, for example, paying someone above the agreed pay scale if they agree to work towards a qualification or, in a trust which has schools in multiple local authorities, they may receive a higher salary in return for working across a wider geographic footprint. The Government’s approach removes the ability to do that; every individual element in an employee’s pay and conditions has to be above a minimum standard, rather than allowing an employer to pay someone more in return for greater flexibility or the commitment to a work towards a higher qualification.

The Minister wrote to me on 1 September. I will not detain the House by going through the examples, but all the examples in that letter were where this legislation will not apply. We are interested in and worried about where it will apply.

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[Lord Leong (Lab)]

My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords for their thoughtful contributions to today’s debate. The debate has been wide ranging, from special constables and heritage railways to the SSSNB. I am grateful for everyone’s valuable insight. I will address the points raised by all noble Lords.

On Motion C, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, for indicating his support for the Government’s proposed amendment in lieu.

On Motion K1, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Parkinson, on his new role within the Heritage Railway Association. I am grateful to him for working with the Government on this matter and look forward to continuing to work with him and my noble friend Lord Faulkner.

I will address Motion N1 and the points raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Barran. First, I want to make one point absolutely clear: I can confirm that the Bill will not set a ceiling on pay. In fact, it sets a minimum standard—the floor—where all support staff are entitled to negotiated pay. When taken together, the SSSNB measures in the Employment Rights Bill, the teacher pay measures in the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill and subordinate legislation respectively will mean that teachers and support staff in all maintained schools and academies in England can rely on a minimum pay offer. All schools will be able to innovate with pay. No one is saying that they cannot pay more than the minimum pay offer; they can be innovative in their pay and conditions to attract and retain the very best workforce that they need for our children.

We are legislating for a new statutory body for school support staff rather than extending an existing system. School support staff have been without a school-specific national voice for far too long. It is right to establish a body where minimum terms are negotiated and agreed by school employer and employee representatives. As most noble Lords will know, roughly half of the 22,000 state-funded schools in England are now academies, and the body is being newly established, so it is right that academies are included in the statutory remit of the SSSNB in the same way as maintained schools.

As I said earlier, beyond the minimum offer, school support staff will be able to benefit from more favourable pay and conditions. The SSSNB will also allow for greater consistency in the relationship between roles and training, and no one is saying that staff cannot be accorded any training support and pay. It will be up to the SSSNB to agree how this is to be done and what the core offer will look like.

This can all be done by local arrangements. We want there to be a core offer that all support staff can expect to receive, with flexibility for employers to go beyond that in their respective local circumstances. Employers will be able to retain contracts for their employees that contain more favourable pay and conditions than were agreed prior to the SSSNB regulation.

I hope I have answered some of noble Lords’ concerns. I urge all noble Lords to give due consideration to the Government’s amendments and trust that Members will feel able to lend support to our position.

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

On the noble Lord’s last point about employers being able to retain their existing contracts, in the letter I received from the Minister, the noble Baroness, Lady Smith of Malvern, on 1 September, she writes in relation to that specific point:

“As set out above, a term of an employee’s contract will only be altered by regulations where this is not detrimental to the employee. This allows employers to retain pay and conditions for their employees that contain more favourable pay and conditions … provided”—


and I stress this point—

“all terms are the same as or more favourable than statutory minimums”.

If an employer today has an employee whom it is paying well above the statutory minimum but is requiring them to work in more schools than would be in the standard role profile, that employer will no longer be able to continue the same contract. It will have to, I guess, reduce the scale of that employee’s work and reduce their salary. Does the Minister think that is a good outcome?

[Lord Leong (Lab)]

I thank the noble Baroness for that. I must admit that I have not had a chance to look at my noble friend Lady Smith’s letter. As far as I know and have been told, employers will be able to retain contracts for their employees that contain more favourable terms and conditions that were agreed prior to the SSSNB. Basically, if they are offering more than what is negotiated, they can keep the terms, but it should not be less than that.

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

I am sorry to intervene again on the Minister, but I asked this question specifically of the noble Baronesses, Lady Jones and Lady Smith, because that is what employers are worried about: that their existing staff will suffer as a result of this. I think the noble Baroness’s letter is absolutely clear. It uses the same language that the noble Lord has in his speaking notes but with the additional detail that all terms are the same or as favourable. I believe that we will not vote on this Motion until a little later, so if the Minister is able to clarify things in the meantime, I would be grateful.

[Lord Leong (Lab)]

I thank the noble Baroness for that. I will make sure that I read the letter and will ask my officials to confirm in writing for her.

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[Lord Fox (LD)]

My Lords, I welcome the Minister’s response from the Dispatch Box, but I will speak to this Motion a little, to set it in context and perhaps put down some markers for the discussions that will be happening with the Secretary of State.

Responding to the spirited work of my noble friend Lord Palmer, this House voted overwhelmingly on Report, with cross-party support, to expand the right of workers to be accompanied at a disciplinary or grievance hearing by a trained companion. The provision was removed by the Government in the other place because of concerns about potential increases to cost, complexity and length of such hearings. The Liberal Democrats disagree with the Government’s position, because there is no evidence to support it; in fact, there is excellent evidence to the contrary that trained companions reduce cost, complexity and escalation. We hear this from organisations that already accompany workers on a non-statutory basis, and we can see it in the research of ACAS and in other academic areas.

None the less, this amendment in lieu presents a reasonable compromise, as I think the Minister has conceded. It would allow the Government to conduct a proper review into the creation of a new category of trained companion, at which point any concerns could be properly examined. In the spirit of working collaboratively, I hope that we can now move forward on this and that, instead of frustrating this process, we can develop one that is a proportionate step to enable the Government to examine this issue properly and finally take into account the experiences of the vast majority of its own voters, let alone the country, who are not members of a trade union and still need support in times like this.

I turn briefly to Motion M1, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Sharpe, and spoken to by his colleague, which would reinsert a Report stage amendment requiring that industrial action can proceed only if at least 50% of those eligible to vote in a ballot participate. We continue to support this amendment, which would maintain the status quo.

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

My Lords, I speak briefly to support, from the perspective of teachers, the comments by the noble Lord, Lord Fox. Of course, teachers and other front-line caring professionals carry immense responsibility for the welfare and safety of children, which brings with it considerable legal obligations that few other professions face. Employers in schools are rightly duty-bound by safeguarding law to investigate every allegation, however unfounded it may later prove to be. As a result, teachers are far more likely than most to face formal hearings during their careers.

The number of allegations is rising sharply, with data from Teacher Tapp, which surveys about 11,000 teachers every day, showing that, in the last academic year alone, allegations against teachers increased by around 35% compared with the previous year; that figure rises to nearly 60% in schools with the highest proportion of pupils on free school meals. As we have debated earlier, in this Bill and others, technology is changing the landscape, with an ability to create ever more complex complaints using artificial intelligence.

As the noble Lord, Lord Fox, said already, this carries a human cost but also a financial cost, with suspended teachers remaining on their salaries while schools fund cover. Some local authorities are spending hundreds of thousands pounds each year on suspended staff awaiting hearings, and still more when flawed procedures lead to tribunal claims.

The right to be accompanied by someone trained to provide calm, professional support is not an indulgence but a practical safeguard. The strength of feeling in the profession is clear and almost unanimous: according to Teacher Tapp, 97% of teachers believe they should be entitled to a trained companion, whether or not they belong to a union, and almost two-thirds say they would wish to have legal representation. This speaks volumes about the professional anxiety that teachers and other school staff face when formal allegations arise.

I hope very much that, when the Minister comes to close, he can confirm that this review will look closely at how accompaniment rights operate in practice, including teachers and other school staff within that to make sure that those who dedicate their lives to educating and caring for our children are treated with the fairness, dignity and compassion that they deserve.

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Moved by

[Baroness Barran]

at end insert “, and do propose Amendment 121B in lieu—

121B: Schedule 4, page 195, line 18, at end insert—
“(3) The SSSNB must not restrict employers from introducing terms and conditions of employment beyond the national framework, provided that such terms in aggregate meet or exceed any minimum standards set by the SSSNB and are designed to—
(a) improve the skill levels of staff,
(b) ensure that staff can meet the needs of children,
(c) raise standards of support for children, or
(d) improve recruitment and retention of support staff.
(4) In determining whether the terms meet or exceed any minimum standards, none of the following conditions may be considered as breaching the minimum standards—
(a) CPD and professional development requirements;
(b) promotion dependent on securing particular qualifications;
(c) working patterns that have pay consequences;
(d) role-specific responsibilities including requirements to work with other employees in other schools or locations.
(5) The Secretary of State may, by regulations, add to the list in subsection (4).”

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

I thank the Minister for that clarification, but I take little reassurance from it, in particular the idea of what will happen in the next few years to the focus of the SSSNB. In this House, we make legislation beyond the next few years. With that, I would like to test the opinion of the House.