My Lords, the other Liberal Democrat spokesman wants to come in, so I will be brief. I did not realise that she was going to stand at that moment. I apologise.
I very much support and endorse the wise words of the noble Lord, Lord Collins, in his cluster of amendments, and the equally sagacious contribution from the noble Lord, Lord Oates, on these matters. Clause 4 is one of the areas where even the most objective supporter of the need for modernisation of procedures between trades unions and employers would say that there appears to be a dark intent behind them. It would cause unnecessary difficulties for unions in the normal pursuance of their functioning, including when trade disputes arise, allowing an unfair advantage to be built in on the employers’ side. Yet, while a large number of employers remain silent, the ones who have been consulted express grave reservations about this Bill.
I always like to assume good intentions on the part of any Government, so I assume that this Bill had been drafted by the normal team of parliamentary draftsmen on behalf of the Government, therefore within an objective capsule of content. But the tone and content are repeatedly suggestive of outside agencies, including maybe the IoD—I apologise in advance if I am getting that wrong and being unfair—and more likely the Institute of Economic Affairs and, even more sinister, the Centre for Policy Studies, giving their suggestions and ideas about these matters. A modest number of rather right-wing oriented business leaders in this country—most business leaders are not right wing, left wing or whatever, just sensible and pragmatic—who are more myopic about the subtleties of modern industrial relations and the good balance between employers and unions have also had their contributions registered and put into the machine and been redrafted by professional draftsmen.
In moral and practical terms, a Government elected by 24% of the electorate in the last general election should not be allowed to put such provocative ideas into Clause 4 and other clauses that we will debate after this. I hope that the Minister will once again think very carefully about the implications of pressing
ahead with a poorly drafted, provocative and narrow-minded text, which will surely cause severe problems in industrial relations if it is allowed to pass. If it goes back to the other place I hope that they will also have second thoughts and that this will be carefully considered, not least by Members on the government side. I keep my promise now and allow the Lib Dem spokesman to speak.