Kmflett's Blog

Rights at Work legislation. The spectre of Blair

The Government’s Rights at Work Bill is back in the Commons after the Lords made several amendments in an attempt to water down the contents. Keir Starmer has said that the amendments will be voted down. However the Tories who voted en masse against the Bill when it was first debated in the Commons, together with the right-wing media, have continued to demand that it is the rights of big business not workers that are important.

According to the not reliable source of the Telegraph, the Tony Blair Institute does not support day one employment rights. It agrees that the current two years is too long to wait for rights but argues six months is reasonable. The point at issue here primarily is unfair dismissal. If a worker is performing poorly it can be lawful to dismiss them at any time. The argument against day one rights seems to be one in favour of bad bosses who just want to hire and fire at will.

Tony Blair has history when it comes to watering down employment legislation.

The 1997 Labour Government headed by Tony Blair promised to address the years of Tory anti-union laws by reinstating what it claimed would be a level playing field at work. The bigger issue was the introduction of a National Minimum Wage. This was opposed by many business interests on the basis that it could not be afforded, (a strong echo is to be found in 2025) would not work and so on. However it was implemented and remains in force, albeit many would argue it should be higher.

The second was a Parliamentary Act on Employment Relations. Its notable that this did not become law until July 1999. It was not seen as a priority and there was a fair bit of time spent listening to business about it. It did not repeal any Tory anti-union law but instead gave legal force to trade union recognition and representation. It was a step forward from the Thatcher years but a modest one.

Cabinet Papers available at the National Archives give an indication to what had been going on.

In the autumn of 1997 there is a file note of what is described as a ‘long and fractious discussion’ between Tony Blair and John Prescott on Fairness at Work. Prescott said that changes had been bought as a package by the TUC and if changes were planned this would need to be agreed by the Cabinet. Blair responded that the changes were practical ones because of what he claimed were genuine problems in how they would work. Blair wanted to allow a right of appeal to the measure, eventually implemented, which would mean that if 50% of workers voted for union recognition it would be automatically given. Prescott again argued that he did not think what the TUC had put forward was up for negotiation.

Employment rights were not part of Prescott’s Ministerial brief and the matter does not appear again until we find a file note from Peter Mandelson on 9th March 1998. It says ‘Union Recognition. Moving in the direction of the CBI. Ideal response for the TUC to be grumpy but not refuse to co-operate’.