Strikes (Minimum Service Levels) Bill

Lord Hendy Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 26th April 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hendy (Lab)]

My Lords, it would be churlish not to acknowledge that we appreciate what this amendment will do.

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

My Lords, noble Lords have broadly welcomed this and clearly want to move on to another section, so I do not think I have any points to raise in response.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Fox (LD)]

My Lords, I will speak very briefly to both these amendments, which have my name. There might be an argument that the ends justify the means, but this does not deliver the ends. This false promise does not work. The means we are discussing here will poison industrial relations. The means we are discussing here will make recruitment into public services much harder, because working conditions will be made worse. The means we are talking about here will also remove predictability when we have a workplace dispute, because, as has been noted, people will go off sick and refuse to do overtime, and that will make the job of managing through a strike much harder.

The last group talked about protecting employers from this unwanted Bill. This group talks about protecting workers and unions from this unwanted Bill, and I ask your Lordships to support both these amendments.

[Lord Hendy (Lab)]

My Lords, I rise to support Amendments 4 and 5. I will be brief and speak only about Amendment 5. The purpose of the proposed new Section 234E is objectionable, for all the reasons my noble friend Lord Collins has spelled out: the ethical objection to requiring a union to undermine its own otherwise lawful strike. There is a more fundamental point here; this is an elephant trap. The purpose of this provision is to enable employers to get injunctions to prevent unions conducting a strike that has been balloted.

I am reminded that, 44 years ago, I stood at the Bar of this House as junior counsel in a case called Express Newspapers Ltd v McShane and Ashton. Since then, I must have done dozens of strike cases. I know what my learned friends will say, representing employers in the sort of case where this issue arises; they will say that the union has failed to take reasonable steps. The union will produce a witness statement setting out all the steps it has taken, and the employers will say, “Ah, but there’s one step you didn’t take”, and they will say what it was.

This Bill does not say what the reasonable steps are or what factors are to be taken into consideration. That is in contrast, for example, to Section 238A of the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992; in dealing with dismissals during a strike, it set outs the words “reasonable steps” and says expressly what factors a court is to take into account in determining whether reasonable steps have been taken or not.