Blacklisting

Stephen McPartland Excerpts

Wednesday 16th October 2013 Westminster Hall

[Stephen McPartland (Stevenage) (Con)]

I am grateful to you, Sir Alan, for the opportunity to speak in this debate, and I congratulate the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Glenda Jackson) on securing it and on her wonderfully impassioned speech. I will speak for only 10 minutes because, as she said, if hon. Members cannot say what they want to say in 10 minutes, they should not stand up. I shall try to learn from her vast experience.

Blacklisting is completely wrong. Not only does it destroy individuals, their confidence and their personality and who they are, but it destroys their family and prevents them from earning, working, contributing to society and being part of a wider whole. It is wrong for a variety of reasons, and I could wax lyrical on that. I know from my upbringing in Liverpool that blacklisting is a terrible disease, as the hon. Lady said, and must not be allowed to take root. It is illegal and should not be allowed in this country. I am proud that, as the hon. Member for Luton North (Kelvin Hopkins) said, this country has always been good at welcoming people who have been blacklisted in other countries. I want to put it clearly on the record that blacklisting is completely wrong.

I shall focus my comments on the construction industry, but I will not refer to the case going through the courts at the moment, Sir Alan, as you asked us not to. There are 3,213 victims of blacklisting, and we are well aware that around 2,500 people on that database do not know that they are on it. Will the Minister impress on the Information Commissioner the need to contact them directly to make them aware of that?

[John Mann (Bassetlaw) (Lab)]

I found out that I was on the Economic League blacklist during the 1980s only when Ciba-Geigy Chemicals gave me a job but then withdrew it for no good reason. The list was published at an event at the university of London, and I found my name on it. How can there be any decency in society if people are on a blacklist, particularly if they have not found work? I was lucky because I was in work and kept work, but some people lose work or do not get it without knowing why because someone, for whatever reason, decided to put them on a list?

[Stephen McPartland]

The hon. Gentleman always makes powerful and impassioned points, and I agree with him. There can be no justice in society if people are on a blacklist without knowing. I urge the Minister to ask the Information Commissioner to contact those 2,500 people who do not know that they are on a blacklist and make them aware that they are.

I am not a member of any union, but with, I hope, the support of the GMB union and the hon. Member for Luton North, we will launch a cross-party campaign to contact the 44 construction companies that were involved in that blacklisting database, the idea being to ask them to apologise and to provide compensation. What we would ultimately like is for no one in the Government or local government to provide them with any public sector contracts or money until they have taken those actions.

[Steve Rotheram]

The hon. Gentleman is making really important points. There seems to be cross-party consensus on trying to contact everyone on the list, many of whom do not know they are on it. Would he support a call by UCATT and other unions for a public inquiry into the scandal?

[Stephen McPartland]

I often agree with the hon. Gentleman, but I reserve judgment on a public inquiry. We have had the result of the Leveson inquiry and no one is sure what the outcome is, and I am keen to get justice for the 3,213 individuals on the blacklist.

[Kelvin Hopkins]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on his speech. I am pleased to be working with him on the GMB campaign. He mentioned the possibility of compensation and apologies. Does he agree that what we really want is those people to be back working in the industry?

[Stephen McPartland]

I completely agree, and that is why it is important that the Information Commissioner contacts the 2,500 people who do not know that they are blacklisted to make them aware of that, so that they can get on with their lives. At the moment, those 2,500 people cannot get a job and do not know why. I do not want to stray too far into that area, so I will talk about the campaign.

We know that 44 companies are involved, but they are not all involved in the court case. The hon. Member for Luton North and I, supported by the GMB, will publish a website and write to the chief executives of construction companies asking them to come clean. We will publish the letters and the replies, and will then contact the larger shareholders to identify whether they believe that it is ethical to invest in those companies. The campaign will be long-running and is designed to provide justice for people who are currently blacklisted.

I genuinely believe that blacklisting is not about politics, or about one party or another. It is completely wrong; it is a disease; and it should be excluded. I know some Labour Members question it, but at the moment, there is cross-party consensus.

[Jim Sheridan (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (Lab)]

The hon. Gentleman will recall that the old Economic League was funded by the Conservative party.

[Stephen McPartland]

I do not recall that, but the hon. Gentleman might not be aware that I was the first Conservative Member of Parliament in history to write for the Morning Star newspaper. I am often asked whether I am on the left or right of the Conservative party. For me, the reality is about focusing on what is in front of me, and in this case, it is a database that was completely wrong. Those individuals require justice, and I am happy to be working with the hon. Member for Luton North on that.

[Natascha Engel]

I am sorry to press this point, but it is very important: the database can only be exposed if there is a public inquiry. The public inquiry on Leveson exposed the extent of phone hacking, so I think this is a good example of why we should have a public inquiry, to make sure that every name on the database is exposed and that the individuals are told.

[Stephen McPartland]

As I said, I want the Information Commissioner’s Office to contact all the individuals on the database who do not know that they have been blacklisted. It is up to the Minister to respond on whether there will be a public inquiry. I have made my position clear: I am reserving judgment, simply because I want to focus on getting justice for the individuals who have been blacklisted. I believe, like the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn, that although we are focusing on the construction industry, the reality is that blacklisting has no doubt gone across lots of other sectors, and there is probably a range of other databases that none of us is aware of. I shall focus on this specific issue, and if there is a public inquiry into the wider aspects of blacklisting, so be it, but at the end of the day, we need evidence to be able to create that inquiry. As I only have a minute left, I will not take any more interventions, as I want to finish within the 10 minutes.

I sum up by saying that I believe blacklisting is wrong. It destroys families and has a pervasive effect on British society and the values that we all hold dear. It should not be a political issue; the focus should on providing justice, so I am happy to work with the GMB union and the hon. Member for Luton North to do so.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—