Trade Union Bill

Kirsten Oswald Excerpts

Monday 14th September 2015 Commons Chamber

[Rishi Sunak]

I agree with my hon. Friend. In today’s world, it is important that we maintain a competitive economy and increase employment, and having trade union legislation that is updated for that modern economy is vital if trade unions are to ensure their relevance in today’s economy.

[Kirsten Oswald (East Renfrewshire) (SNP)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Rishi Sunak]

I am sorry, but I would like to make some progress.

I was proud to see that it was the original one nation Conservative Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli who first legalised the picket line. That is a legacy that I, and I am sure my colleagues on the Front Bench, have no intention of turning away from. In fact I commend the majority of unions who work successfully with the police and other authorities to ensure safe, lawful and constructive picket lines. But if those picket lines become a means to intimidate non-striking workers and impact their families, something has gone wrong. Intimidation or harassment of individuals is simply not acceptable in today’s Britain.

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[Oliver Dowden]

Of course strikes are intended to be disruptive, but one of the fallacies that has been put forward by Labour Members is that the Bill proposes to take away people’s right to strike. It simply seeks to balance the interests of the workers in the trade union against those of other workers who are subjected to the effects of the strike.

[Kirsten Oswald]

Is the hon. Gentleman aware that the chief executive of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development has suggested that the Bill is dealing with problems of the past and has nothing to do with the current situation?

[Oliver Dowden]

The hon. Lady might say that, but recent analysis shows that in the past four years, 3 million days have been lost to strike action. I am not content with the impact of that on my constituents. Hertsmere is close to London, and when there is a tube strike or a train strike, my constituents are massively adversely affected. I am not saying that that should never happen, but the Bill will rightly set a balance in three important respects.

First, the Bill states that if a strike is to be called, there will have to be a vote of at least 50% in favour of it. If the strike action is to be taken by those working in core public services, such as transport or education, four out of every 10 people in that union will have to vote in favour of it. Contrary to the assertions of Labour Members, this will not stop strikes happening. Indeed, the latest analysis shows that between 50% and 60% of strikes would still go ahead under the new legislation, but we must rebalance the interests of the workers who are trying to serve their communities with those who are going on strike.

The second important principle relates to workers in my constituency and elsewhere who are members of trade unions but who do not necessarily share the goals of the Labour party.

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[Kirsten Oswald (East Renfrewshire) (SNP)]

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker, for calling me to take part in this important debate. It has been interesting listening to the contributions of other hon. Members and, in particular, to the excellent speech made by my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow South West (Chris Stephens). I hope to make a contribution from a slightly different perspective from that of some of my colleagues today.

Before being elected to this place, I spent all my career working in human resource management. In the interests of transparency, I should say that I am a member of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development. I worked for many years in a job where I sat as part of the management side in negotiations with trade unions, so I come to this debate with an outlook developed at least partly as a result of my professional background. I am contributing as someone who has had to make difficult decisions when dealing with challenging employment issues, including collective redundancy negotiations and industrial action.

I also come here, however, as someone who knows that the most challenging situations and all the difficult discussions were entirely more productive and more effective, and carried more weight, because they were dealt with in partnership with trade unions. I did not always agree with my trade union counterparts, and they certainly did not always agree with me, but that is surely the point: sometimes there will be different perspectives, and that is entirely healthy and appropriate. It is clear that when tough decisions have to be made, communication is the key to an effective and productive workplace culture. We do need to accept, however, that occasionally we will not agree, no matter how much discussion we have had—that is a fact of life—and no Bill will make employers and staff agree on everything.

What this Bill will do is: ensure that any disagreement is squashed by management, without any constructive dialogue; render any dialogue that there is futile; and ensure that the important and constructive voices of staff are lost, drowned in a welter of arguments about minutiae of process or brushed aside. This Bill is a recipe for turning disagreement into conflict, and for escalating a short-term problem into a fundamental break in relationships in the workplace. Interfering in the employment relationship with this restrictive and provocative Bill is a backward step. It appears to be driven more by ideology, and by malice towards trade unions and their members, than by any desire to improve industrial relations.

We have already heard about the leading academics in industrial relations who wrote to the newspapers describing the proposals as “draconian” and “perverse”. They recognise the positive contributions of unions to performance, improvement and innovation in the workplace, and they decry the Government’s proposals as undermining the ability of unions to protect terms and conditions, and leading to the loss of employee voice. They are right to point out that this Bill will also have an impact on those who are not members of trade unions. They say that

“it will feed into the labour market by increasing endemic low pay and insecure terms and conditions of employment among non-unionised workers.”

Even the Chancellor is now persuaded that low pay is a problem that we have to grapple with, so we must wonder why the Government are so keen to introduce this Bill. If they were serious about looking at the relationships between employees and their representatives, they would focus on how to engage and involve employees and unions in increasing productivity, through fairer and supportive rights for workers. If we look at the current levels of industrial action, as summarised by the Library, we see that it is difficult to fathom what reasons, other than ideological ones, the Government can possibly have for seeking to make these changes. The Government sell themselves as being interested in productivity and business, but these proposals run entirely contrary to that ethos. The Bill introduces unnecessary new and complex bureaucracy: it will increase costs for unions and employers, as legal disputes develop; and it undermines social justice. If this Bill is passed, and I sincerely hope that it is not—

[Mr Deputy Speaker]

Order. I call Richard Fuller.