My Lords, these statutory instruments introduce what is, effectively, a tax on trade unions and subject them to criminal-style fines for breaches of complex labour law. This is part of a package of measures that includes allowing anti-union organisations to file time-consuming complaints against them, without a full parliamentary consideration.
These changes are the wrong priority for Ministers and come at a tough time for unions. Union members, including doctors, nurses, school staff, transport workers, care staff and shop workers, have been on the front line of the coronavirus pandemic, and unions have worked flat-out to support workers working right across our economy. Adjusting to an array of new rules, and facing time-consuming complaints initiated often by hostile groups and additional financial burdens, will drain union resources from the vital work that they undertake. Unions are accountable to their members and have a strong track record of complying with their legal duties. The Certification Officer’s annual report for 2020-21 reveals that she dealt with just 34 complaints in that year. Not one enforcement order was imposed.
The Government have portrayed these changes as tidying up and as unfinished business left over from the Trade Union Act 2016, but it is notable that Ministers have not dealt with other outstanding issues stemming from that legislation—issues that could benefit trade union members by extending and improving the quality of democracy, such as electronic balloting.
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The Trade Union Act 2016 contained measures to overhaul the role of the Certification Officer, who is responsible, as we have heard, for statutory functions
relating to trade unions and employers’ associations. That legislation contained a levy to fund the CO’s work, financial penalties on unions for breaches of statute, and to enable the CO to be given greater investigatory powers. For the past five years, these provisions have remained dormant. However, without much notice, in June 2021, the Government announced that they intended to activate the powers. They then ran a further engagement exercise—as the Minister has fairly set out—on the levy element, which closed in July.
We contend that these plans are bad for working people in our country. The Government intend to recoup the cost of running the Certification Officer from those she oversees from April this year. The vast bulk of this will come from trade unions and their members. Some costs, including external legal advice and external investigators, will be excluded. The Certification Officer has estimated that she is likely to need a budget of £1.15 million. The TUC believes it is inappropriate to treat trade unions like profit-making companies, which are often required to fund their own regulator. Unions are not, as we have argued on many occasions, for-profit organisations; they are set up solely for the benefit of members. Other bodies with social roles, such as political parties or charities, do not pay levies to the Electoral Commission or the Charity Commission, respectively.
As a result of the levy, unions will have less capacity to negotiate better pay and conditions for working people. There is no significant limit, as far as we can judge, on how much the levy can grow in the future. There is huge scope for a future Certification Officer to further expand their role, confident of course that the expenses for such activity will be met by unions.
The Government also propose disproportionate penalties of up to £20,000 for statutory breaches; for example, in the running of general-secretary elections. These penalties resemble fines in criminal proceedings. However, they can be imposed on the basis of a civil rather than criminal standard of proof. In our view, there is no need or justification for these new penalties. Unions are accountable to their members through their democratic structures and have a long track record of complying with their legal duties.
As I said earlier, the Certification Officer’s annual report shows that she dealt with just 34 complaints last year—that is one complaint for every 200,000 union members. Not a single enforcement order was necessary or imposed. This is a disproportionate measure, having disproportionate impact on working people’s organisations.
The provisions, which require just a commencement order, will give the Certification Officer new, wide-ranging investigatory powers on matters such as elections, political fund management and union mergers. Currently, the Certification Officer can act only on complaints from a union member, but unions could now face often time-consuming complaints stimulated by groups hostile to the work of unions.
I mentioned earlier that there are other priorities to which the Government could have turned their attention for improving the way in which unions operate. Introducing a levy and increased powers for the
Certification Officer is not merely tidying up; it goes much further than that. Other issues, including electronic balloting, remain outstanding. The Act required an independent review of allowing unions the option of using electronic balloting during statutory votes, such as elections of general-secretaries. Unions increasingly use them for non-statutory ballots, such as indicative votes on pay claims. Other organisations, such as the National Trust and even the Conservative Party, use such approaches for their selection procedures, using e-balloting for key votes.
The review, which was published in December 2017, recommended pilots as a first step. However, more than four years on, Ministers have yet to respond to it. Unions believe that electronic balloting would better meet the expectations of members and encourage greater participation in their democratic structures. Surely that objective is one we can all share. I therefore invite the Minister to give a commitment this evening to bring forward regulations that would enhance democratic participation by union members, rather than adding burden to the work that unions undertake.
This Government have rarely shown themselves to be a friend of our unions, but they could begin to repair the damage to that relationship by simply parking this vindictive, unnecessary and redundant legislation without losing face. It adds wasteful expense to union activity and will force unions to deal with additional red tape—both things Conservatives traditionally oppose.
What of the levelling-up agenda? Unions have levelling up in their DNA; it is in the way they think and act. This measure goes against the spirit that the Government are trying to mobilise to improve our communities—our working communities in particular—up and down the country.
I hope—not with much expectation—that the Minister will adopt a sensible and proportionate course of action this evening, but in the absence of that, I hope the House will support my amendment to the Motion. I beg to move.