Robert Jenrick
Main Page: Robert Jenrick (Conservative - Newark)Department Debates - View all Robert Jenrick's debates with the Department for Education
(8 years, 7 months ago)
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Robert Jenrick (Newark) (Con)
I speak in support of the Bill but not against the trade union movement or its members. In fact, I hope to work with the Unite union to set up a taskforce for a business, Flowserve in Newark in my constituency, where Unite is representing my constituents powerfully and efficiently. I want to reach out to it in the days to come.
In my own family history, I see the trade union movement at its best—as an important voice for the expression and protection of working people faced by endemic low pay and appalling working conditions. My great-grandfather, James Barrett, was a leader of the general strike in Manchester. He was drawn to trade unionism by the plight of his wife, my great-grandmother, Mary Ridge, whose first husband, a trade unionist before the great war, was blacklisted, unable to work, and forced to emigrate to the United States. He was unable to afford a ticket for both of them, leaving my great-grandmother behind in Salford to look after their children, essentially to rebuild her life, before eventually finding out that her husband had died a broken man in the United States years afterwards. Men and women like these—there are many others in the history of this country—were driven by their concern for the condition of working people they saw around them, the most vulnerable in society. They were, as Harold Wilson liked to say about the Labour party, driven more by Methodism than Marxism.
It is in that spirit that I approach this Bill, asking myself and this House how we can best defend and enrich the rights and the working lives of all people, but particularly the most vulnerable working people in society. The imperative to represent the common good of all working people lies at the heart of this Bill. That is all the more important today, as membership of trade unions continues to decline. At least 79% of the working people of this country are not members of trade unions.
Lady Hermon
The hon. Gentleman will be well aware, I am sure, that a very high percentage of people who are trade union representatives and members are extremely concerned about this Bill’s possible infringement of their right and freedom to assemble, which is guaranteed by article 11 of the European convention on human rights. Whatever he and his colleagues think about it, that was the best decision the Labour party made when it brought it home in the Human Rights Act 1998. Where in this Bill can he point to the guarantee that there will not be an infringement of article 11 of the European convention?
Robert Jenrick
Nothing in this Bill infringes the right to strike. It asks trade union bosses to achieve a higher mandate for those strikes. That can only strengthen the position of those trade union leaders, who will have the power and authority to win a clear mandate from their members.
Robert Jenrick
Let me continue. Today the majority of those in trade unions are not the working poor—53% of members are in professional, associate professional or managerial occupations. Only a minority are in lower skilled, invariably lower-paid occupations, such as caring, leisure, processing, plant and machine work. Today’s trade unions predominantly serve middle-income workers. The figures show that those earning less than £250 a week—roughly the equivalent of a full-time job on the minimum wage—are the least likely to join a trade union. Just 13% of those workers are members, which is a smaller figure than the proportion of those earning more than £1,000 a week, who make up 22% of trade union members.
Robert Jenrick
If I may continue, most working people in lower-skilled, lower-paid roles are not part of trade unions, and it is they who are most deeply impacted by the disruption of strikes, particularly in key public services, including education and transport. It is right that this House rebalances our trade union laws in favour of all working people. It seems entirely reasonable, therefore, that, among other sensible reforms and amendments, we introduce a 50% threshold for ballot turnout and a 40% support threshold for key public services.
Wes Streeting
The hon. Gentleman seems to be a reasonable man who has misunderstood the Bill. He says that he wants to help workers and defend their rights and that he supports the threshold, but what possible explanation could there be for Government Front Benchers to continue to tell us that they will not support electronic balloting? How can that possibly be reasonable in the 21st century?
Robert Jenrick
The hon. Gentleman will have heard my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State say that he is deeply concerned about fraud, which is in no way in the interests of fair strikes and the trade union movement.
Robert Jenrick
Let me continue. Far from diminishing the voice of trade unions, as I said in response to the hon. Member for North Down (Lady Hermon), achieving the thresholds would increase the legitimacy of trade unions with management and shareholders and in the eyes of the general public. As we politicians know only too well, a strong mandate increases our legitimacy and the power and authority of our actions, and we have heard a lot over the past few days from the trade unions and their leaders about the value of a strong mandate.
As a result of this Bill, there may well be fewer strikes on less substantive matters that are not viewed by the unions’ own members as sufficiently serious to justify putting their employer and thus their job in jeopardy or that seriously inconvenience customers and the general public. Those that do go ahead will have a greater mandate and higher legitimacy, and consequently will need to be taken much more seriously by everybody involved in the negotiation.
John Mann (Bassetlaw) (Lab)
I thank my parliamentary neighbour for giving way. He will recall the mass demonstration in his constituency following the unofficial power workers strike, when 5,000 people marched. I spoke at the rally and it concluded a dispute that involved a lot of the hon. Gentleman’s constituents. Is he aware that those constituents of his who participated would be criminalised by this Bill?
Robert Jenrick
The key issue is that trade union leaders should speak for their members and achieve a clear mandate from them.
Robert Jenrick
Other Members want to speak, so let me come to the end of my remarks.
The only unions and leaders who need fear these reforms are those who do not believe that they can regularly convince their own members of the veracity of their arguments—those who have essentially lost touch with the high ideals of the founders of the trade union movement. I think back to my ancestor, Mary Ridge. What would she have thought of the union leader who last year called a strike of teachers based on ballots that were years out of date and in which fewer than a quarter of teachers voted? It closed a special school in Newark at which parents, already struggling with the demands of juggling jobs and caring for children with special educational needs, had to take time off work or seek specialist childcare at short notice. What would she have thought of the female city cleaner on a low income trudging home through the streets of London because trade union bosses had taken tube drivers, whose average starting salary is £50,000 a year for 36 hours a week, out on strikes?
Robert Jenrick
I will not give way, because Madam Deputy Speaker wishes me to finish my remarks.
My ancestor would be surprised and ashamed by what some of the current trade union leaders have become.
In conclusion, there is unease among working people in this country about their economic lives and the economic situation around them. Much of that is to do with concentrations of power: the banks, the utility companies, and the housing market favouring existing owners. Organisations such as the CBI, the BBC or monopolistic companies such as BT Openreach speak loudly, but it is unclear whom they represent. Such organisations protect the interests of the privileged few. The Bill must be seen as part of a wider effort to move our economy and our society away from vested interests and the stifling effects of corporatism and back in favour of the common good of all working people in this country.