Becky Gittins

Becky Gittins

Labour — Clwyd East

Speaking in the House of Commons on 12 March 2025

Debate

Employment Rights Bill

Contribution

I rise in support of Government new clauses 57 and 58. I refer Members to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests and my proud trade union membership. I ask the Opposition to consider their comments today in what has proved to be a very ideologically driven debate on their part. I feel somewhat as if I have been transported back in time to a previous reforming Labour Government’s last upgrade to employment rights—the minimum wage debate. This afternoon’s fearmongering about productivity, growth and unemployment is reminiscent of it. We also have seen some crossover in the personnel who were part of the Conservative opposition. The then shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, the right hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Sir Iain Duncan Smith), said that the minimum wage would “negatively affect…not hundreds of thousands but millions of people.”—[Official Report, 4 July 2017; Vol. 297, c. 526.]

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