Fairness at Work and Power in Communities

Kirsty Blackman Excerpts

Thursday 12th May 2022 Commons Chamber

[Kirsty Blackman (Aberdeen North) (SNP)]

In giving some thought to what I might say today, I thought that the best way I could say, “Where is the employment Bill in this Queen’s Speech?”, would be to quote the Scottish TUC, which absolutely got it right:

“20 times the Tory UK Government promised to bring forward an employment bill. Absolute silence in today’s State Opening of Parliament. True to form, Tories have shafted workers and armed bad bosses. Devolve it already.”

I could not say it better than that. The Minister has given us all sorts of promises about an employment Bill, as he has been doing all year, like many other Ministers. We cannot believe anything that he says in relation to the employment Bill, because it has not been forthcoming. He promises and promises and clearly cannot convince the UK Government to actually deliver—if he even believes it should come through at all. There are so many reasons why we need an employment Bill—why it is absolutely vital and more so today even than it was when it was in the Conservative manifesto back in 2019 or when the Taylor review was published more than five years ago. It is desperately needed because of the cost of living crisis that we are seeing and the absolute pain that our constituents are going through. The Conservatives might want to try to rebrand it as a cost of living crunch, but it is an absolute crisis that people are struggling with every single day.

The first thing that we would like to see in the employment Bill is a proper living wage and the removal of the age discrimination within it. The living wage is not actually enough money for people to live on. The UK Government have continued to call it a living wage, but it is a minimum wage rebranded as a pretendy living wage, because people cannot afford to live on it. We can see that from the fact that the Child Poverty Action Group has said that 72% of families with children where at least one parent works are struggling to afford food. If this Government were committed to making work pay, those people would not be going to food banks. They would not be in poverty while working. They would not have to have so many jobs, including zero-hours contracts. Because they have so many jobs that are so low-paid, they do not meet the thresholds for things like auto-enrolment or statutory sick pay. They do not get any of the benefits that people should get with work because the work is not paying. We see the level of stress, pain and mental health suffering that this is causing people. If the UK Government decide that they want to put employers first, ahead of employees, then surely they should recognise that employees having no money and living with that level of stress makes them worse employees. If that is the key thing for the UK Government, they should be trying their best to improve lives for employees by making sure that work actually pays.

We would like to see flexible working requests available from day one. The UK Government have promised to look at that. Some 29 months ago, they said they would look at neonatal leave and pay. Where is it? They said they would look at making flexible working the default 29 months ago. After 29 months, nothing has happened. There is nothing in the Queen’s Speech about that. They said 43 months ago that they would like tips to go to workers in full. Where is the legislation? They said 54 months ago that they would evaluate shared parental leave. We have been waiting 54 months for UK Government action on that, and they have failed and failed again, and they failed this week in the Queen’s Speech.

The Government have said that they want to look at redundancy protections for women. That was mentioned by the deputy leader of the Labour party, the right hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Angela Rayner), who made a very good speech that I agreed with the vast majority of. We need to see new mums being given that protection. Having been made redundant when I was pregnant, I know how painful and difficult that situation is. We need to see those protections in place for new mums.

The reality is that the lack of action by this Government has enshrined inequalities and means that the gender pay gap and the gender pension gap will continue to grow, because women are more likely to be on low pay and low hours, working a number of different jobs and not being put into auto-enrolment. The UK Government are making things worse for this generation of workers and future generations of pensioners, as well as for current generations of pensioners.

We saw some action in the Queen’s Speech on fire and rehire specifically for seafarers—it is not actually in relation to fire and rehire, but the P&O issues that there have been. Although I welcome the Bill, and I am glad that action is being taken on low pay for seafarers, it is not for all seafarers; it is for ferry seafarers. It covers only people who work on ferries, and it is not any broader than that. Representing a port in my constituency, I am keen to hear the Government explain how they will indemnify ports having to take action against large boats and large companies. How will the Government ensure that those ports are not put at risk by the action they should be taking? I agree that action should be taken, but I do not want this to land in the lap of the ports and for them to be left holding all the responsibility. The UK Government should be taking action to press for changes in maritime law to ensure that everybody who is in a boat or ship within our seas is being paid a living wage, not just those on UK-flagged boats.

We are five years on from the Taylor review. Why did the Government bother doing the Taylor review? What was the point in all the money, time and hard work that went into it? Nothing has happened and nothing has come of it. Nothing has changed for people working in the gig economy or for people working in companies where they are pretending to be self-employed. Those changes have not been made. People are still living with the level of uncertainty that the deputy leader of the Labour party mentioned, getting texts the night before saying, “Your shift is being cancelled”, or suddenly being given an extra shift that they somehow have to find childcare to cover. They are still living without the benefits of having a pension, sick pay and all those things that workers should have to be able to live lives and not just live to work. We all should be aspiring for our constituents to be able to live, to enjoy living and to have fair work that they can go to.

I want to mention the Brexit freedoms Bill, which has a hilarious name. It is about taking back control—which is ironic—to the UK Government. It is about taking back control away from Parliament and taking back control from having things in primary legislation and moving it to secondary legislation, ensuring that the UK Government can do what they want to remove the protections put in place by EU law. The only reason why we have the level of workers’ rights that we have, and the only reason why we have been saved from the Tories’ untrammelled reductions in workers’ rights, is EU law. The Brexit freedoms Bill will undo that. It will allow them the absolute power to do what they like with our workers’ rights and to ensure that employers are put first rather than employees at every possible opportunity. The Government must absolutely commit not to roll back workers’ rights—not that it will mean anything if they do say it, but it would be useful for us to be able to repeat it back to them—and to increase the protections in place for workers. The promises that they have made need to come through.

We have been asking for years for employment law to be devolved. I would love for the Labour party to back us in that call. If it did not back us on this, it would feel a bit like it was willing just to let us sink with the rest of Britain. It would be very nice for the Scottish Parliament to have control of this area, because we could make a positive difference to workers in Scotland, even though we have a Tory Government and even though the Labour party is letting down workers in Scotland by failing to call for employment law to be devolved. We have made these cases on behalf of our constituents and the people of Scotland: we want employment law to be devolved.

The longer that this Tory Government continue to refuse to devolve employment law; the longer they continue dismantling the protections in place for workers; the longer they keep coming on television saying things like, “People are using food banks because they can’t budget”, or, “People should just work a few more hours and that will be great; that will reduce the need for them to have the £20 universal credit uplift”; the longer they continue to refuse to increase benefits by anything close to inflation—the Scottish Government have increased benefits by almost double what the UK Government have increased them by this year, and the Scottish Government have a child poverty action plan in place—the stronger the case they are making for independence. They are making that case stronger for the Scottish people, who can see the two Governments working on their behalf. They can see the Scottish Government enshrining fair work and principles in every single thing we do and putting the wellbeing of the population first in every single thing we do, and they can see the Tories doing everything they can to dismantle those protections, to reduce social security in real terms and to ensure that people do not have enough money to live on, and they can see them to step up to solve the energy crisis. The case for independence is getting ever stronger, and the Conservatives’ continued failure is bringing the reality of independence much closer every single day.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts). I agree with him about one thing, which is that the Government need to show a lot more conviction in expressing their opposition to windfall taxes. They are a simplistic solution that always end up hurting hardest the ordinary people who work in this population. I am against windfall taxes, and if I have time I will say a little bit more about that later.

Who would dare to criticise the content of the Gracious Speech delivered in Her Majesty’s platinum jubilee year? I am certainly not going to criticise it, but I would like to begin by drawing attention to some omissions from it. I referred to one of them in an article carried in today’s “ConservativeHome”, headed “Harm from Covid vaccinations. Don’t leave victims behind.” That is a reference to the need for changes to be made to the vaccine damage payment scheme. Currently, the maximum payment under that scheme is £120,000, which has not been increased since 2007. By way of comparison, as my hon. Friend the Minister on the Front Bench will know, industrial injuries disablement benefit has in the same period gone up by 39%. When I discussed this with my hon. Friend the Member for Erewash (Maggie Throup), the Minister for vaccines and public health, she indicated that she took the point and understood that something needed to be done. I hope that in responding, the Minister will be able to say what is going to be done and why the Government believe it is fair that this level of £120,000 should continue to remain unchanged since 2007.

The newly formed vaccine injured bereaved UK organisation, vib.uk, which has been established in the last few days is also calling for much wider changes to the vaccine damage payment scheme. I think they are absolutely correct and in the article to which I have referred I explain why I support its suggestions for fundamental reform of the scheme to make it more flexible and relevant to the plight of those who have suffered as a result of doing the right thing by getting vaccinated.

[Kirsty Blackman]

Unfortunately, I missed the article this morning but I will be sure to read it. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that one of the biggest issues with this scheme is the length of time it takes for decisions to be made? People are waiting a significant length of time even to get an initial contact with the vaccine damage payment scheme. Does he agree that that is one of the key things that needs to be fixed?

[Sir Christopher Chope]

Absolutely, and I have been campaigning for changes since I first raised this issue in the House last September. In the article I refer to the fact that at the meeting I had with the vaccines Minister on 21 April she told me that, at last, an organisation has been appointed to carry out the administrative job of assessing the claims. There are now over 1,300 claims and the first assessments have not even begun, but I am told they will now begin on 16 May. The new organisation that has got the contract is committed to dealing with 1,800 such assessments each year, which is an indication of the extent of this problem. As the hon. Member for Aberdeen North (Kirsty Blackman) rightly says, it is appalling that we have had to wait for so long, and only last autumn the Prime Minister was assuring a correspondent that people who have suffered vaccine damage should not be ignored and left to suffer in silence. So I very much agree with the hon. Lady on that point and again commend the article to her.

Another significant omission from the Gracious Speech is any reference to the promised changes from RPI to CPI as the measure for calculating the maximum annual increase in charges for pitch fees for park home residents. This issue is dear to my heart; I have been chairman of the all-party group on park homes for many years, and the Government have outstanding, overdue business not just on that aspect but on dealing with the issue of rogue operators in that field.

When I was first elected in Christchurch—25 years ago, Madam Deputy Speaker—I would never have been able to contemplate that we would have a Conservative Government presiding over the highest levels of taxation in a generation and with inflation raging at 10%. I note from the Gracious Speech that the

“Government will drive economic growth to improve living standards”—[Official Report, 10 May 2022; Vol. 714, c. 4.]

and I hope I am right in concluding from that that the Government are not going to introduce any further tax increases. Yet there is talk, even from some of my Conservative colleagues, about new tax increases: so-called windfall taxes. Describing a tax as a windfall tax does not make it any less of a tax and I am concerned that the Government still seem to be flirting with the idea of ever higher taxes despite all the evidence showing that windfall taxes would be a further disaster.

--- Later in debate ---

[Kemi Badenoch]

I am not giving way, because Opposition Members do not want me to list these things. We are protecting the vulnerable, including pensioners, with winter fuel payments of up to £300 and cold weather payments of £25 a week. We delivered a record cash increase in the national living wage, meaning a £1,000 salary boost for full-time workers. We raised the national insurance threshold from July, saving an average worker £330 a year. We cut fuel duty by 5p for 12 months. As I mentioned, we cut the universal credit taper rate.

[Kirsty Blackman]

Wil the Minister give way?

[Kemi Badenoch]

No, I am not giving way because the selective amnesia of Opposition Members never ceases to amaze me. They refuse to acknowledge the policies that they know we have carried out and they agree with. They pretend money is not being spent when we have spent it—and not just spent, but spent in unprecedented amounts. So there is no use giving way, just for them to repeat the same arguments they have been making over and over during the course of the debate.

I will move on to the comments made by the hon. Member for Barnsley Central (Dan Jarvis). He talked about levelling-up funds and money for local government. He knows that, as the Minister with responsibility for local government, this is something I care about very passionately. I know he is no longer a Mayor, but I will be working with local government leaders across the country. We have boosted funding to councils by £3.7 billion this year, an increase of over 4.5% in real terms, which will ensure councils have the resources they need to deliver key services. The poorest areas will receive 14% more per household than the least deprived areas. On who got levelling up funding, the truth is that all of this is based on the quality of the bids. We cannot guarantee that we can fund every bid, when they are compared with what is being presented by others.

The other thing Opposition Members say is that we have done absolutely nothing for the last 12 years. Just to remind them, in the last three years alone we have tackled the greatest public health emergency in a generation, delivered a historic funding boost to the NHS, ended the cruel lottery of social care costs with our £36 billion health and social care plan, led the world in the fight against climate change with our COP26 presidency, and tackled crime, closing over 1,500 county lines. We have delivered for the whole of the United Kingdom, securing vaccines for all four nations and agreeing the largest funding settlements since devolution.

[Kirsty Blackman]

If the Conservative Government have done all those wonderful things, how come my constituents cannot afford to eat?