Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)

My Lords, I rise to speak to Amendments 105 to 107 and 109 to 112 in my name, and I am delighted to have the support of my noble friend Lady Noakes and the noble Lords, Lord Morse and Lord Vaux of Harrowden, who has already spoken so eloquently as the mover of the first amendment in the group. I agree with the noble Lord that this is the most damaging part of the Bill, which is why I have joined proceedings today. I support all that he has said, including his Amendment 334. The approach in Amendment 334 may reflect the Government’s intention on timing, so I look to the Minister to support this clarificatory amendment. I also thank the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, for a very useful online meeting and for a speedy response to my queries from her excellent office. My main current concern is the promotion of economic growth. It is also the Government’s stated main objective, with the Prime Minister saying that: “Growth is the defining mission of this Administration”. Yet, the need to drive growth conflicts with their manifesto promises on employment rights. These will slow growth and increase bureaucracy and inefficiency across the economy, especially the proposal to specify reasons if employees are let go in the period immediately after appointment, which is the subject of this group. The Government cannot have it both ways, and with growth prospects so poor next year, changes must be made to the Bill. There is evidence to support this. The noble Lord, Lord Vaux, has already quoted from the impact assessment. Careful reading of the DBT economic analysis of 21 October, written to support the Bill, admits in section 16, on unintended consequences, that: “There is some evidence that employment reforms make employers less willing to hire workers, including evidence specific to the strengthening of dismissal protections. For example, the OECD”, an external body, “noted that more stringent dismissal and hiring policies involve an inherent trade-off between job security for workers who have a job, and firm adaptability to changes in demand conditions or technology”. In other words, it implies lower growth. Noble Lords will know of my own background in retail and wholesale, working for many years at Tesco, a company that had a unique partnership with the trade unions. Indeed, the noble Lord, Lord Hannett of Everton, and I worked together, and I am delighted that he now sits on the Labour Benches and only sorry that he is not here today. Retail is a sector that leads the way in employing the economically excluded and those who need flexibility in their hours and location of work. The noble Lord, Lord Hannett, is sitting there, just not in his usual place. However, I understand from the BRC, which has recently surveyed HR directors, that there could be a significant impact on hiring decisions, particularly for those starting in or returning to the workforce after a period of leave or inactivity. That includes those coming back from parental leave or those who have been unemployed for an extended period. The changes could reduce opportunities for entry level jobs—27% of the retail workforce is under 24—and for those from disadvantaged backgrounds. As our birthday boy, my noble friend Lord Hunt of Wirral has already explained, it also jeopardises the vital increase in our apprentice population, which is desperately in need of a simpler and more flexible system —another reason to think again. All this uncertainty is bad for the Government’s wider objective of growth and, very important, for getting hundreds of thousands off benefits and into work. Without a genuine probation period, employers, especially smaller employers, will no longer be willing to take a chance on people for fear of being stuck with bad or unsuitable employees or facing unaffordable compensation bills after a very short time.