Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme

Debate between Patricia Gibson and Gavin Newlands

Thursday 17th September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)]

I beg to move

That this House welcomes the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme and calls on the Government to examine, improve and extend that scheme’s operation and application to ensure that people who started work after the furlough scheme started are included and that this support continues until the UK’s economy is more robust, so that the goal of retaining as many jobs as possible is secured.

I first applied for this debate in May, but the matters at hand are as relevant now as they were at that time, and perhaps even more so as we continue to struggle with the challenges of covid-19 and its serious and far-reaching consequences. I wish to say at the outset that I will not press for a vote on the motion, because it would simply eat into the talking time in the next important debate.

The job retention scheme was established by the UK Government. At the time, it was a very welcome response to the disruption caused by the virus, helping to keep workers and families afloat during difficult times. It would be wrong, indeed churlish, to say anything else. I know that this point will be explored in the next debate, but every single MP in the House will have had emails from constituents who have been deprived of any support through no fault of their own—the newly employed, the newly self-employed, freelancers and so on. The injustice of being excluded from support has profound consequences for those affected. For six months, some have had no wages coming in, and for far too many there is no end in sight to their troubles.

For these people, this issue should have been quickly addressed by the Chancellor, when the up to 3 million excluded came to light. It should have been addressed and still can be addressed, but it has not been, so their debts are building, their futures are uncertain and they are simply being ignored. Hearing, as we have many times in this Chamber, of the Chancellor’s bounty for other workers does not pay their bills; it only increases their sense of being overlooked and ignored. The words “We are all in this together” ring hollow and mocking in their ears, and we shall hear more about that in the next debate. Now we face the situation of the job retention scheme being wound down at the end of October, with hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, of people losing their jobs.

In previous debates, Government Members met the common-sense arguments in favour of extending furlough with cries of “This scheme can’t last forever”, and I presume that that is because they simply cannot answer why it needs to be wound down in October. Extending the furlough scheme by a mere eight months could save 61,000 jobs in Scotland alone. In much of Europe support schemes are being extended, not curtailed, with Germany investing 4% of its annual income in recovery compared with the UK’s feeble 1.3%.

We must save jobs that are sustainable in the longer term until our economy is more robust. Many self-employed people—people overlooked entirely by the job retention scheme—must also be included, otherwise we will face a wave of job losses and millions will face enormous ongoing financial hardship, with some sectors of our economy taking years to recover and some jobs lost forever.

[Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)]

My hon. Friend talks about some sectors struggling and transport, in particular aviation, would be one of those sectors. Does she agree that if the Government do not extend a version of the furlough scheme for all sectors they should at least be looking at doing so for specific sectors that are really struggling?

[Patricia Gibson]

My hon. Friend is absolutely correct. We need sectoral support, and some areas are desperately looking for help, but we also need to extend this scheme in general.

To wind down the scheme and withdraw all support at the end of October, just as payment holidays are ending, will do huge damage to workers and their families, as many will face losing their homes and any hope of financial recovery. Tens of thousands of viable jobs could be saved with an extension of support. We know, as we have heard from my hon. Friend, that the aviation and aerospace industries and the tourism and hospitality sectors are struggling badly, as are our night-time industries. They have been hit very hard, and the Institute for Public Policy Research has estimated that 3 million jobs could be lost, most of which would remain viable in the longer term if support were to continue.

The Fraser of Allander Institute reports that 55% of Scottish businesses using the job retention scheme expect to reduce employee numbers when it ends.

Rolls-Royce (Redundancies)

Debate between Patricia Gibson and Gavin Newlands

Wednesday 10th June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Gavin Newlands]

Who do I pick? I give way to my hon. Friend the Member for North Ayrshire and Arran (Patricia Gibson).

[Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)]

I thank my hon. Friend for giving way; I predict that he will continue to be generous with his time as we all seek to intervene on him.

I appreciate that the focus of this debate is on Rolls-Royce, which is quite appropriate given that my hon. Friend has been leading on this issue as a constituency Member who faces a lot of redundancies in his constituency. I know he will agree with me, because he has done a lot of work on the fact that BA has also announced 12,000 redundancies, added to the 9,000 at Rolls-Royce and the terrible treatment of the workforce at BA. I know that my hon. Friend shares my concern that this is only the tip of the iceberg; is he, like me, hopeful that the Government will intervene? This is the tip of the iceberg and we are going to see tens of thousands more jobs lost across the whole aviation, travel, tourism and aerospace sector. Does he agree that we need urgent Government action right now?

[Gavin Newlands]

I think I was told that I would agree with my hon. Friend, so I do agree with her—I agree completely with what she says. I will come on to discuss British Airways, so if anybody else has an intervention on British Airways, perhaps they should wait until that section of my speech .

--- Later in debate ---

[Gavin Newlands]

I concur with my hon. Friend. In fact, executives formally allude to the fact that there are different rules and regulations in other countries, and the UK workforce will bear the brunt.

[Patricia Gibson]

I thank my hon. Friend for giving way so frequently. This is a debate about Rolls-Royce, but is it not a concern that when bad practice is used for all to see, it emboldens other companies in bad behaviour? British Airways has set a bad example with its arrogant attitude to its employees, and it has always had terrible industrial relations. It fails to appreciate that the company is built on the back of the loyal workers; some have worked there for decades. In that context, we are all afraid of what might now happen with Rolls-Royce.

[Gavin Newlands]

I totally agree. I said at the start, when British Airways came out with that horrendous proposal, that it would potentially give the wider sector cover to do something very similar. I have certainly been told stories of small and large businesses looking to do something similar and perhaps waiting to see the outcome of what happens if British Airways is allowed to carry on.

In both cases, Rolls-Royce and British Airways management have made great play of their roots, history and heritage here in this country. In both cases, that pride seems to extend only to proffering their hand for taxpayers’ cash. When it comes to repaying those taxpayers by keeping them in employment, supporting the industry and working together to tackle short-term problems, that heritage suddenly evaporates. Two thirds of Rolls-Royce’s proposed worldwide job cuts are set for the UK. That shows the loyalty the management have towards the communities and citizens of this country.

At the moment, Rolls-Royce employs roughly 52,000 people globally, of whom 23,000 are UK employees—about 44% of the entire workforce, down from 64% in 2000. That is in part as a result of some global acquisitions, but it is also the result of a previous restructuring which offshored jobs from the UK. It is hard, therefore, not to conclude that Rolls-Royce prefers to offshore UK jobs, rather than to work with sector partners and the UK workforce to recover and rebuild for the future, despite the fact that it has been in receipt of £670 million of UK Government money—mainly research and development money—over the past 20 years.

Rolls-Royce in Inchinnan is at the heart of the new advanced manufacturing innovation district that I described. That district represents a drive for world-class manufacturing and industry. I mentioned earlier that those buzzwords have almost become clichés, but in the case of Inchinnan they are 100% true. The maintenance, repair and overhaul of Inchinnan is world leading to the extent that for many years its workers have been sent around Europe and the far east to assist the company’s operations there. Five years ago, Rolls-Royce were recognising the

“dedication and flexibility of the Inchinnan workforce who continue to play a key role on the success of Rolls-Royce.”

What has changed in those five years? If Inchinnan plays a key role, why is it being singled out, disproportionately, as the hardest hit plant in the UK? It is difficult to reconcile Rolls-Royce’s previous faith in the workforce with the treatment it is now meting out.

Ministers have often stood at the Dispatch Box in this Chamber and lauded the kind of manufacturing that Inchinnan is renowned for—as they should. But the test is not what is said in this place and recorded in Hansard; it is the action the Government take to protect and promote our manufacturing sector, particularly at a time when the industry needs action from the state. So far that action has been virtually non-existent when it comes to my constituents and others around the UK. The UK is home to one of the world’s leading aviation and aerospace sectors. It supports more than 1 million jobs in the UK. It is one of the important strategic sectors of industry in this country, if not the most important. It is high time the Government acknowledged that and acted accordingly. We need to hear what the Government plan to do, because when these jobs go, very few, if any, will return. Other global sites will absorb that capacity, and those skills and those jobs will be lost to these shores.

Successive Administrations have made great play of the power of the free market, as if Milton Friedman himself had the skills and craftsmanship to produce the kind of output my constituents produce every day. That sort of ideological nonsense is dead. The impact of covid-19 has shown the need for the state to have a key role in setting the strategy for our economy and intervening where required. The workforce at Inchinnan have shown that they must be listened to, and that decisions must be taken by management after discussion and in consultation with them; not as a paper exercise, but as part of a real long-term plan.

I ask the UK Government to use their influence and power to intervene not just for my constituents in Inchinnan, but for all our aviation and aerospace businesses and workers. This is not the time to let our industries down. The Government laud high-skill production. Now is the time for them to show that they are interested in deeds, not words.