It is sad that there are so few Tories here tonight when they are destroying the rights of trade unionists and democracy itself. Who are trade unionists? They are simply working people—6.5 million of them—with an insurance policy for tough times. There are not a lot of strikes at the moment, but this Bill will provoke more and more. In fact, only one in five ballots leads to a strike, and the statistics over previous years show that the average trade unionist will strike only one day in 15 years. There is no problem to be solved; this is an ideologically driven attack on people’s rights to democracy and collectively to stand up for their rights at work.
We have seen problems with productivity and exports in industry. Exports of goods are now down to the lowest level since 2010. We want co-operation and collaboration to boost productivity, not a recipe for further conflict, but instead we see a Bill that will provoke people on the streets, quite rightly, to stand up for their rights. That will be an ugly affair that we do not want to see.
We have heard that the Bill is in breach of article 11 of the European convention on human rights. Russian television approached me to talk about it, partly because I am a member of the Council of Europe, as it was thought to be such an appalling abuse of people’s rights. We have heard about democracy and the fact that abstentions would count as no votes; we would not expect that of a totalitarian regime or a dictatorship. We have heard from the Mayor of London, who chose to confuse a quorum, which involves turnout, with people not participating at all being counted as voting no. That is either mischievous or stupid.
Intimidation will now occur, and there will be surveillance of social media. Where are we going with this? We see attacks on trade unionists in undeveloped democracies, such as Colombia, and we saw them in pre-war Germany. This is reaching an awful level and we should all resist it vehemently. Agency workers will now be seen as scabs and not as trustworthy parts of the community. We have seen division between nations, with Wales and Scotland not being consulted, between management and workers and between workers themselves.
Aneurin Bevan said that poverty and property—by which he meant the Tories, of course—come into conflict in times of austerity, and that the Tories would respond by taking away democracy. This is another step towards eliminating our democratic rights, alongside the gerrymandering we will see in the boundary changes and the individual registration changes. This is a horrible time for Britain. People will resist the Bill and the Tories should think twice about moving forward with such an awful bit of legislation.
8.38 pm