Strikes (Minimum Service Levels) Bill

Debate between Andy McDonald and John McDonnell

Committee stage
Monday 30th January 2023 Commons Chamber

[Andy McDonald]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. This is about targeting people. People will be selected for treatment under these work notices, and trade unionists will be singularly picked out to add to the humiliation and distress. It is a dreadful tactic.

[John McDonnell]

The practical reality is that for some workers this takes away the whole right to strike. An example in my constituency is air traffic control. There is no such thing as a minimum service guarantee in air traffic control, and the same can be said for rail signalmen. This process will extend the denial of the right to strike to whole batches of workers, and we need to acknowledge that in this debate.

[Andy McDonald]

My right hon. Friend has hit the nail on the head. There are workers who are going to be denied that fundamental right to withdraw their labour, and that is a step that should be taken with a great sense of foreboding and concern.

The Bill could also lead to bankruptcy for trade unions as they become exposed to lawsuits that could wipe them out. Notably, there is no minimum service required of the Government in the Bill. If workers are required to provide minimum service levels on strike days, why is there no such requirement for the Government and outsourced private providers on non-strike days? As we have seen in the course of these disputes, workers and unions are well aware of their legal and moral obligations, but this Government’s cynicism stinks. They are more than happy to sit on their hands when there are more than 500 excess deaths a month in our NHS, but they are suddenly sparked into action over concerns about public safety when strikes occur. If they were genuine in their concerns they would give those workers a proper pay award, but instead their real determination is to strip away their rights.

Patients are not dying because nurses are striking. As the RCN says so eloquently:

“Nurses are striking because patients are dying.”

Under the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992, it is already unlawful to take industrial action in the knowledge or belief that human life could be endangered or “serious bodily injury” caused as a consequence. In short, life and limb cover is always maintained. I know that the Conservatives are itching to sack nurses, but the RCN handbook sets out in great detail how those nurses will provide “life and limb” cover—the very task that they have undertaken on our behalf before and during covid and will continue to undertake for as long as they have the energy to do so.

The reality is that if this Bill is passed, public services will get even worse. It has long been established that the right to withdraw one’s labour is a fundamental liberty, and it is trade unions who won us the basic rights of annual leave, sick pay, the two-day weekend, the eight-hour day, health and safety protections at work and much more. We need strong trade unions, not only as a right in themselves but to protect the rights we already have and to fight for more. By attacking the right to strike, and by extension the trade union movement, the Government put all this at risk and there will be even more disruption.

The only Government internal impact assessment found that imposing minimum service levels could lead to an increased frequency of strikes. The Transport Secretary admits the new laws will not work and the Education Secretary does not want them. Inside Government there is a recognition that public services will be the likely casualty of an ideologically motivated attack on the right to strike. Much has been said by Conservative Members and by the Secretary of State in particular about their sudden love affair with the International Labour Organisation, praying in aid the ILO’s approach to minimum service levels, but what the Government conveniently omit to mention is that convention 87 of the ILO sets out the criteria that this Government want to ignore. It stresses that the introduction of a negotiated minimum service as a possible alternative to the total prohibition of strikes should be contemplated only when the interruption of services would endanger life or the personal safety of the whole or part of the population.

The Government have also omitted to say that in other jurisdictions and economies there is much greater collective bargaining by trade unions for better terms and conditions for their members. The comparison with the UK is ludicrous. The ILO says that a minimum service should be a genuine and exclusively minimum service—which this Bill does not prescribe—and that unions should be able to participate in defining such a service. As the right hon. Member for New Forest East (Sir Julian Lewis) has said, disputes should be resolved not by the Government but by a joint or independent body that has the confidence of the parties. There are examples, not only across Europe but across the world, where such practices obtain, but the Bill is as silent about them as it is about any sensible and proper safeguards, leaving the law by diktat entirely to the wide Henry VIII powers vested in the Secretary of State.

It therefore makes sense—as envisaged by amendments 83 and 84, which I commend to the House—to engage the CBI and the TUC in these matters and to pursue resolution disputes through ACAS if it comes to that. In any event, the High Court certification set out in new clause 1 is necessary to ensure that this country meets its full obligations, in respect not only of convention 87 of the ILO but of the obligations set out in the European social charter of 1961 and under the UK-EU trade and co-operation agreement. We are parties to all these treaties and we need to make sure that we abide by them. New clause 1 addresses that. As it stands, we have not seen any risk assessment testing those obligations. Professor Keith Ewing told us in the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee that

“we cannot remove the EU social rights inheritance, because of article 387, where the removal is motivated by trade and investment, which seems to be the motivation here.”

He went on to say:

“Brexit does not mean release from international obligations or even from our continuing obligation to comply with European law.”

In 13 years of Tory rule, numerous pieces of anti-trade union legislation have been passed. The Strikes (Minimum Service Levels) Bill is only the latest attempt to neuter the power of workers, and there is no reason to assume that it will stop there. This dreadful, ideologically insane Government are thankfully on their last legs, but in the time they have left, they are clearly determined to continue their attack on the rights of workers and the services they work in. It will be another sad day for this country if the Bill passes its Third Reading tonight, but the Government should be in no doubt that, in doing this, they will be hammering another nail into their own coffin.

Public Service Pensions and Judicial Offices Bill [Lords]

Debate between Andy McDonald and John McDonnell

Report stage
Tuesday 22nd February 2022 Commons Chamber

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)]

I declare an interest in that I am a member of the local government pension scheme. I want to address the amendments standing in my name—new clause 10 and amendments 22 and 24—but I would also like to comment on new clause 1.

On the debate about whether or not this is public money, I thought, as a member of the local government pension scheme, that the Supreme Court was pretty clear that this is not public money in the sense that would enable the Government to issue guidance. However, I have to say that new clause 1 goes further than guidance; it actually includes directions as well. I work on the basis, as I did when I was employed in local government, that the money I earned and the money forgone to invest in my pension scheme was my earned income; it was not public money under the control of the Government.

I think there is a lesson for us all here in that I believe that only in extremis—only in extremis—should the state interfere in one’s own privately earned income. I say that because, in the pension scheme regimes we have at the moment, we have an element of representative democracy with the trustees often being representatives of the workforce and other experts. That reassures me that, as a member of the pension fund, I have an element of say in what those trustees do, if they are appointed, and that enables me and other members of the pension fund to exercise an element of control over decision making, but also to exercise an element of conscience.

[Andy McDonald (Middlesbrough) (Lab)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that the clumsy way in which new clause 1 has been worded will create a chilling effect on risk-averse pension scheme managers in fulfilling their fiduciary duties and other responsibilities? Does he also agree that it will significantly incapacitate the ability of pension schemes to invest ethically, and the rights of pension scheme members and pension schemes to express and have ethical views taken into account in the investment of their own money?

[John McDonnell]

I agree with the first point, but let me take up that last point, because I just want to explain to other Members where I am coming from and get it on the record.

On moral grounds, I have argued very strongly within my own local government pension scheme—so far, I have to say, unsuccessfully—that I do not want the money I have earned, and part of my pension is my earned income, to be invested in a number of states. They include Saudi Arabia, because of its involvement in Yemen. In fact, I have organised demonstrations when there were visits from various representatives from Saudi Arabia to this country. I have argued that I do not want my pension invested in China because of the treatment of the Uyghurs. Again, I have engaged in demonstrations on that, and also on the moral ground that a number of trade union friends I have worked with over the years are currently in prison as a result of the operation undertaken by the Chinese state in Hong Kong. Yes, I have argued against investments going into Colombia because of the murder of trade unionists, and I have also argued against investments going into Israel because I do believe—according to the Amnesty human rights report, and many Jewish institutions—that it is an apartheid state in the way it treats the Palestinians.

That is my position: on moral grounds, I want to be able to influence the investments. I do not want my pension invested in armaments or fossil fuels either, and I believe that that is my right. I do not believe it is the role of the state to ride roughshod over my moral choices without extremely good reason. Given the threat of climate change and other matters, there may well be, in extremis, reasons for the state to act, but I do not think that this new clause is in that context.

Social Security and Pensions

Debate between Andy McDonald and John McDonnell

Monday 7th February 2022 Commons Chamber

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)]

I resent the premise of this debate. I resent the Government bringing forward an unamendable order on such a significant issue, because that leads to the conclusion, as the hon. Members for Amber Valley (Nigel Mills) and for North East Fife (Wendy Chamberlain) said, that if we reject the order there will be no increase whatsoever. We should not allow Parliament to be blackmailed in that way. The response is fairly straightforward: on the issue of poverty in this country, there has to come a time when this House rises up. We have heard example after example. We can all give examples from our own constituencies—the heartbreaking stories of how people are suffering at the moment. So we should not accept the Government bringing forward an unamendable order and expecting us either to go through the Lobby like sheep and vote for it, or to abstain.

[Andy McDonald]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that this country is facing a crisis that is being visited on the poor, and that to put this House in the position of simply having to accept it is absolutely reprehensible? We should be demanding that this order be taken away and that we get a proper settlement and a proper increase for the people most in need. Surely that is the duty of this Parliament.

[John McDonnell]

I completely concur. I understand those who say that if we vote against this tonight we will be accused of voting against an increase, but far from it—if we vote against it we will be instructing the Government to come back immediately with an alternative that meets the cost of living challenge that working people now face.

It is no good relying on statistics from seven months ago when we know the crisis that people are facing. I find it interesting that the Government can arrive at flexibility when they are saving money but not when they want to assist our constituents. I say that because I was here for the debate on the triple lock. At that time, as my right hon. Friend the Member for East Ham (Stephen Timms) has pointed out, we were facing the prospect of an increase of 8% based on the triple lock linked to earnings. Actually, that was pretty damn accurate as to what people would be facing. The Government were fleet of foot. They scrapped the triple lock altogether, suspended its operation and then came forward with this.

Every Member who has spoken so far, on both sides of the House, has said that this will mean a cut in people’s living standards when faced with the prospect of a 7% rate of inflation. The hon. Member for Waveney (Peter Aldous) eloquently set out the rationale for why the Government needed to do more, but I say to him that the Government will not do more unless this House is firm in its view and rejects this order tonight. They will not come back with an emergency package unless we start kicking up a fuss on both sides of the House. That is why they have come to the House with an unamendable order. They were worried that if there was an amendable order, we could have had a majority in this House for doing something better on behalf of our constituents. I find it outrageous that they have tried to put us in this position.

The hon. Member for Amber Valley, who is no longer here, made an extremely interesting speech, as he always does. I do not usually agree with him on much, but he always presents an argument we can understand—or a rationale, anyway. His argument to the Government was that if they are trying to tell us that their social security system is meeting the needs of our people, they should publish the basket of goods, the costings and so on. Well, the Government do not do that, but others do.

Frequent reference has been made tonight to the Joseph Rowntree Foundation’s analysis of poverty and of what the Government’s measures will do. The figures are startling. Over 8 million working households are in poverty, as are 2.1 million pensioners and 4.3 million of our children. My hon. Friend the Member for Cynon Valley (Beth Winter) made the point that, in the fifth richest country in the world, we have over 4 million children living in poverty. The figure for disabled people is now 3.8 million, which has increased dramatically over the last four or five years as a result of benefit cuts.

I am not willing to sit here tonight and be blackmailed into either voting for this motion or abstaining. I want the opportunity to vote against it and to give an instruction to the Government to go away and do better: to come back with a real proposal that will increase benefits, at least so that they match inflation. After 11 years of austerity, I would expect the Government to be coming up with proposals to start making up some of the ground that has been lost over that time, as my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham East and Saddleworth (Debbie Abrahams) said.

I will make one final point. Every time we have one of these debates, we get a Government Minister telling us how wonderful they are because they have created all these new jobs that people can go into. I met a group of unpaid carers this morning, and I said that it looked as though their allowance was going to go from 67% to 69%. Given the hours they work as unpaid carers, even if they are doing 35 hours per week—most of them do triple that at times—they will be paid something like £2 an hour for what they do. Unpaid carers save this country about £130 billion in costs that would otherwise fall on the state. They cannot get other jobs because they are looking after their relatives. They are desperately underfunded and most of them, as a result, are living in poverty. This order will do nothing for them whatsoever.

My commitment to that group of carers I met this morning means that I will not vote for this. I will vote against it, and I will demand better action from this Government. I will demand that Ministers go away and come back tomorrow with a realistic proposal that will tackle poverty in this country and lift at least some of those carers out of the hardship and suffering that they are unfortunately experiencing at the moment.

National Policy Statement: Airports

Debate between Andy McDonald and John McDonnell

Monday 25th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[John McDonnell]

I would respect the hon. Gentleman, my constituency neighbour, if he accepted a runway in his constituency south of Heathrow, but he refused.

Look at how much corporation tax has been paid by this company over the past 10 years: £24 million. It has been borrowing to pay dividends more than its profit ratios. That is the nature of the company we are dealing with. It is a company and an operation at Heathrow that has lied to my constituents. When it got the fifth terminal, a letter was sent to my constituents. I had meetings with the directors of Heathrow and they were beside me saying, “We will not seek a third runway.” Within 12 months, they were lobbying for one. We were told by a former Conservative Prime Minister, “No ifs, no buts, no third runway”. They never told us that promise was for one Parliament. The existing Prime Minister backed that guarantee to my constituents.

These are the consequences for my constituents that hon. Members need to know: 4,000 homes will go; 8,000 to 10,000 people will be forcibly removed from their community, the biggest forced removal of human beings since the Scottish highland clearances; and a church, a temple, community centres, open spaces and even our hospices are now threatened. That is what it means to my community. Two schools—where will they go? It is no good offering them 125% compensation. You cannot compensate for the loss of your whole community. We have a housing crisis in our area on a scale not seen since the second world war. We cannot house our existing population. Where will they go? Two schools, at least, closed, with another one, most probably, after that. We have not got enough places for our existing pupils. Where will they go? We cannot find sites to build the new schools we currently need.

Those who get forced out might be the lucky ones, because the ones left behind are already breathing in air that is already poisoned above 2010 EU limits. No effective mitigation measures have been demonstrated to us tonight. We know the health consequences—respiratory conditions and cancer—yet the Government have refused to undertake a comprehensive health assessment.

[Andy McDonald]

Is my right hon. Friend as surprised as I am that there is nothing specific in the revised national policy statement that adequately sets out a framework for dealing with our air pollution crisis?

[John McDonnell]

We have 9,000 people a year in London dying from air pollution, yet there is nothing in the Government proposals that goes anywhere near even thinking about tackling these issues. Those are the consequences for my community, despite all the promises they have been given that their homes would be secure. These are villages that have been there for 1,000 years, to be wiped off the face of the earth—and for what? To ensure that a company maximises its profits. This is a company owned by Ferrovial, which was founded by Franco contracts, by the Chinese state and by Qatar. It is shipping profits abroad, rather than reinvesting in this country. That is what this vote is about tonight.

Budget Resolutions and Economic Situation

Debate between Andy McDonald and John McDonnell

Thursday 17th March 2016 Commons Chamber

[John McDonnell]

I will come back to the hon. Gentleman.

On disability, I am appealing to the Chancellor to think again. We will support him in reversing the cuts in personal independence payments for disabled people. If he can fund capital gains tax giveaways for the richest 5%, he can find the money to reverse this cruel and unnecessary cut.

[Andy McDonald (Middlesbrough) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that if the Chancellor is not going to listen to the Opposition on the draconian cuts to these benefits, he will perhaps listen to Graeme Ellis, the chair of the Conservative Disability Group, who, as a result of these pernicious cuts, is cutting all links with the Conservative party?

[John McDonnell]

I just say this across the House: this is a very important issue—we will not make party politics of this. As someone who has campaigned on disability issues in the House for 18 years, I sincerely urge all Members to press the Chancellor to think again. This cut is cruel, and it is, unfortunately, dangerous for the wellbeing of disabled people.

Deregulation Bill

Debate between Andy McDonald and John McDonnell

Wednesday 14th May 2014 Commons Chamber

[John McDonnell]

No, it is not, but a lot of those workers who were directly employed have in recent years been forced into self-employment against their will. That is the only way that they have been able to get work. If we consider the role of agents in a lot of this, we can see that it is a way of avoiding taxation for some.

[Andy McDonald (Middlesbrough) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend recall the words of Lord Denning many years ago when dealing with this very issue of bogus descriptions? Somebody controls the place of work, the rate of pay and the hours that are worked. We can call a Mini a Rolls-Royce, but it is still a Mini.

[John McDonnell]

I have been involved in some of the direct action campaigns on sites across London over the past two years. Few major firms are left in London that employ people directly; they now employ individuals who are classified as self-employed. They have not gone into self-employment willingly, but have been forced into it simply to get the work.

Let me go back to my major theme. Throughout its history, our health and safety legislation has been based on the precautionary principle of trying to ensure that we prevent as much as we possibly can the risks of individual sectors. I have seen the list that the Minister has kindly supplied us with this afternoon and, to be frank, I think—I am not saying this in any critical way—that if we are going to go down the route of having a list system, it would have been better for us to have had the list well in advance for consultation and discussion. Nevertheless, that is what we will have now.

Let me give some examples from the list. The category for high-risk activities relating to public safety includes the:

“Organisation and operation of exhibitions, fairgrounds, amusement parks, theme parks, zoos, circuses, public fireworks displays and adventure activities,”

but not festivals and concerts, which have some of the highest risks of such outside activities. For offshore activities, it includes

“operators, owners, installation managers, well operators and any persons under various Offshore Regulations”,

but some of the highest risk in the offshore industry is land-based, at the port, before the equipment is transferred out.

In years to come, we will define item by item what is on the list and what is not. It is all well and good publishing a list of what is covered, but if people want absolute clarity we should also publish a list of what is not included. Let me give another example, which I think came up in Committee. If a plumber—they are largely self-employed—is working in a person’s home, will they be covered or not? Are electricians working in people’s homes covered or not? I am not sure from this list, and that is the issue. All our health and safety legislation up to now has been based on the precautionary principle of comprehensive coverage so that everyone is protected, including the workers and the general public in whose environment they are working, but we are now in a situation where no one will know or be absolutely clear about their coverage. As a local MP I have used health and safety legislation on a number of occasions to get the local authority to take action against self-employed workers on particular sites that are putting the general public at risk.

Crime and Courts Bill [Lords]

Debate between Andy McDonald and John McDonnell

Monday 14th January 2013 Commons Chamber

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)]

I want to deal with a couple of clauses that have not been referred to so far, but before I do so let me express my support for the comments made by the right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Mr Llwyd) about clause 31 and the concerns expressed by others about clause 34 and visa appeals. The abolition of those appeals will have a direct impact on my constituents and I believe that there will be a considerable backlash in the community. Let me also express my support for clause 29, which abolishes the offence of scandalising the judiciary as a contempt of court. I understand which case that relates to, but I feel that scandalising the judiciary should be a right, if not a duty, every now and again.

Three clauses have so far not been mentioned in any detail. The first is clause 16, on the establishment of the family courts. It has been genuinely welcomed, as has the introduction of mediation in the processes of the family courts and the greater emphasis given to it. Concerns have been expressed, however, by Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service officers and family law practitioners about the need to ensure that there is adequate insurance in the delegated legislation and the guidance that the views of the children in these cases are properly represented and protected. I hope that there will be further dialogue with professionals in CAFCASS, in particular, who will be able to advise on the detailed implementation of the legislation, and of this clause in particular.

Let me turn now to clauses 23 and 24. My hon. Friend the Member for Middlesbrough (Andy McDonald) mentioned the issue with clause 23, which effectively privatises the functions of the officers dealing with the collection of fees. They are judicial functions, which is a step forward in privatisation that we have not seen before. Clause 23 facilitates the contracting out of all the functions of fines officers and makes provision for the cost of collecting compensation, fines and other financial penalties to be recovered from offenders. That will effectively mean contracting out the functions of those officers to private bailiffs. Let me remind hon. Members of those functions: the decision to make a deduction from benefits order; the making of an attachment of earnings order; and the ordering or varying of the length of time to pay or the amount of the instalments that are payable. Those functions relate to the exercise of judicial power and the sentencing of criminals and they are to be privatised.

My concern about that is that as Members we have all experienced the role of bailiffs in our constituencies. In its evidence to Government in the consultation, “Transforming bailiff action”, Citizens Advice reported that it was dealing with nearly 25,000 cases involving problems with private bailiffs. Citizens Advice said that it

“has been seeing problems with the practices of private sector bailiffs for many years and these problems seem to be growing. Unfair practices we see include: misrepresenting powers; intimidating behaviour; charging fees in excess of what is allowable in law; failing to accept reasonable (in the circumstances of the debtor) offers of payment”,

and failing to recognise vulnerable debtors in particular. We are now passing over a key element of the judicial system to private bailiffs, who have this record of failure.

[Andy McDonald]

Does my hon. Friend recognise that the court staff have had some significant successes in recent times, increasing the rate of recovery by 14%? Does he agree that that improved performance is to be welcomed and that they should be congratulated?

[John McDonnell]

My hon. Friend has hit the nail on the head. There are 2,000 people out there in the service, consistently meeting the targets set for them by Government and improving their record of service by 15% last year, not 14%, as he said. These loyal, dedicated staff, who are professionals in their own field, have delivered, yet are being threatened with privatisation. We are handing over this function to a group of people who we know are causing large numbers of our constituents severe problems as a result of their behaviour in the performance of their duties in other areas of fine collection and in the system as a whole.

All that is being asked for is the opportunity for existing staff to bid for their jobs. As the Bill stands, they will be excluded from being able to continue to perform the functions that they currently perform. Moreover, clause 24 would make available information held by HMRC to private bailiffs for use in the collection of fines. That is a step too far and it breaches people’s ability to maintain personal privacy with regard to their taxation affairs. That was never envisaged in previous consultations.

We have had experience of privatisation in the Ministry of Justice in recent times. Members in all parts of the House have raised the problems that we have had with the contracting out of the court interpreter services, which saw only 58% of bookings met. It resulted in chaos in the courts and criticism from the Public Accounts Committee.

I urge the Government to think twice about the proposed privatisation of an important service that is critical to many of our constituents, and to back the concept that what works is what matters. If the existing system is working effectively, it should not be put at risk as a result of what seems to be an ideological decision, rather than one based upon practice. It would be worth while for the Minister to sit down with some of the existing practitioners to gain their advice and, if the Government want further improvements in the service, to work with the existing staff—with the grain of the service—to achieve those improvements, rather than to go forward with this wholesale privatisation, which will prove to be not only counterproductive but, for many of our constituents, catastrophic.