Contribution
My Lords, I am very grateful to my noble friend Lord Jackson of Peterborough. I had not thought, when preparing my address, to look back to 1834. The only time I ever talk about 1834 is recalling that on 16 October 1834, this whole place burned down and gave rise to the new mother of parliaments we know today. Only Westminster Hall survived that terrible fire in 1834.
All I will say about the Tolpuddle Martyrs who were sentenced to be sent to Australia is that two years later they were pardoned, and they all went to Canada; I think Canada benefited hugely from that exodus. But I am not quite sure that we can read across because so much has changed, as the noble Baroness, Lady O’Grady of Upper Holloway, reminded us.
The noble Baroness also referred us back to the coalition—it was not a Conservative Government but a coalition in 2014—and cited Bruce Carr KC, who I respect hugely. He is a brilliant advocate in this whole field of employment law, but I am not quite sure that I read across in the way the noble Baroness did.
I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Kramer, that it is all a question of balance. We have to try to do our best to get the balance right but, as we draw the debate on these amendments to a close, I want to say how sorry I am that the Government declined to accept these modest but essential amendments, although I pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Katz, for saying that they are well intentioned. Of course they are, because they are rooted not in ideology but in common sense, democratic principle and a genuine concern for those people who will be affected most by this legislation.
Throughout this short debate, we have tried to put across the case that industrial action is not just a technical but a deeply human process. It involves individuals making weighty decisions that affect their income, their job security, their families and the wider community. That is why the processes we set in place to govern these decisions must be fair, private and informed.
We argue in these amendments that workers deserve to vote on industrial action in conditions that are free from coercion or surveillance. We said that the workplace, structured as it is by hierarchies and power dynamics, is not and cannot be a neutral environment for democratic expression. I do not need to go back to the 1970s but, of course, that is when I entered Parliament for the first time, and we saw a lot of decisions made in the workplace that people regretted afterwards.
I ask the Government to consider the very real risk of intimidation, whether explicit or subtle, and to preserve the privacy that postal balloting has long guaranteed. We were not asking the Government to turn the clock back on technological progress; we were just saying that any movement away from the postal ballot has to be accompanied by genuine, enforceable safeguards. Yet, sadly, the Minister refused to accept even the simple premise that the method of voting matters—that how a person votes is as important as the person for whom they are voting.
We also asked for transparency. Through Amendment 250, we sought to ensure that unions undertaking industrial action do so with an honest reckoning of the broader consequences—economic, social and familial. We know that strikes do not happen in a vacuum; they ripple outward, touching the lives of patients, parents, commuters, businesses and whole communities. I certainly do not want to prohibit strikes, but we believe that workers have to be given the full picture before they make a serious decision to withdraw their labour.
I am particularly disappointed because these amendments would strengthen the public’s confidence in this legislation. They would have shown that Parliament is serious about protecting not only workers’ rights but democratic process, public welfare and social responsibility. Instead, the message is now that efficiency is more important than privacy, that speed matters more than integrity, and that the consequences of industrial action—no matter how far reaching—need to be honestly appraised before the strike begins.
All I will say in conclusion is that the debate does not end here. I do not believe that these concerns will go away. The consequences of inaction, the risks of intimidation, the lack of transparency and the damage to public trust will, in time, make themselves known. When they do, I hope the House will remember the case that we have made today. In the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.