Agricultural Wages Board

Debate between Mary Creagh and Simon Hart

Wednesday 24th April 2013 Commons Chamber

[Simon Hart]

It might surprise the hon. Lady to learn that I am not a member of the Government and so I am not really in a position to answer that. Of course, I sat through 13 years of Labour disdain for rural Britain, and that question was asked on many occasions. However, I do not want to be reprimanded by the Chair twice in two days for getting off the topic by talking about union sponsorship, so if she will forgive me—

[Mary Creagh]

The hon. Gentleman said that the motion is somehow sponsored by unions. It is nothing of the sort. This debate is about a point of principle—[Interruption.] I am sorry that Government Members are laughing. This debate is about whether people who work in remote, isolated areas, in unseasonable conditions and in one of our most dangerous industries deserve to be paid 2p an hour above the national minimum wage and to have some sort of protection against eviction from their homes.

[Simon Hart]

The hon. Lady will forgive me if I note that pretty much all the electronic traffic we have seen on this debate has been generated by her party’s biggest sponsor. Call me a cynic, but I am not going to accept her comments.

I believe that workers in my area are protected by the minimum wage, employment legislation and a raft of accommodation legislation applying to tied cottages and the like. I do not recognise the image projected by the Labour party of farm workers in tied cottages, and have 28 years’ experience in the industry. I agreed with the Secretary of State when he referred to the noble Lord Falconer’s comment that regional and sectoral pay was a thing of the past. I find it odd that we seem to be disagreeing with that now.

The final abolition of the AWB raises two questions, both of which have been raised before, but since neither has been answered I will ask them again. If the abolition of the AWB exposes young workers, foreign workers or people who are vulnerable, either through poverty or in some other way, in the way the shadow Secretary of State has set out—I know all about the unique aspects of agricultural work—why is it that no other sector in the UK from which a wages board has been removed is suffering from those consequences? Perhaps she could explain—we asked this question earlier but did not get an explanation—why those dangers are apparently unique to agriculture. I will ask her a third time, more in hope than in expectation: would Labour reinstate the AWB if it was lucky enough to form a Government in 2015? It is no good her saying that they have a couple years to come clean about their proposals. I think that this is absolutely the right forum and the right time to make clear the policy as it applies to the AWB of a party that might—I hope not—form a future Government.