Fire and Rehire Tactics

[Esther McVey in the Chair]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the use of fire and rehire tactics.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms McVey. I am delighted to be able to bring this debate once again to Parliament, and to be able to combine it with a petition that has been signed by over 15,000 members of the public who, like me, feel passionately about this issue.

Ms McVey, I apologise if you are getting déjà vu, because just over a year ago I stood in this same room and spoke about this very matter. My hon. Friend the Member for Jarrow (Kate Osborne) brought an important debate to the House and Members, on a cross-party basis, spoke eloquently for the rights of their constituents in the face of the repugnant practice of fire and rehire. Sadly, the fact that we are here again today is indicative of how little progress has been made by the Government, who have been hiding behind reports and consultations. There has been little concrete action.

Hon. Members would be forgiven for thinking that the Government have been somewhat distracted over recent weeks, as they have been embroiled in another employment debate a little closer to home: Operation Save Big Dog. They have been trying desperately to save the job of a blundering, misleading and morally bankrupt Prime Minister. It is the same old story from the Government: repeated promises, with no action. This is despite the fact that we are approaching the fifth anniversary of the Taylor review.

Hon. Members may recall that, in January 2022, I secured and led a parliamentary debate on the Taylor review and modern working practices. Many of us pressed the Government to keep their promises and initiate reform, but we have had absolutely no joy whatever. We have seen fire and rehire practices condemned by countless Ministers, and the employment Bill has been promised a staggering 20 times over the past three years. The Bill being published has a lot in common with the Prime Minister resigning: both are events that should have happened months ago and that are clearly supported by a majority of the public and MPs, only to be needlessly delayed by Tory incompetence. As they stall, however, unscrupulous employers act.

No less than 10% of workers have faced fire and rehire in their jobs. Almost a quarter of employees say their working terms have been downgraded since the first lockdown, and 800 loyal P&O Ferries workers have been scandalously sacked. All the Government can say is that their planned statutory code will be announced “in due course”. Given how often they say that, I am beginning to think that “in due course” might be their next manifesto pledge and slogan: “Get it done in due course.”

It was not just the issue of the workers being laid off. It was about those whom P&O picked up, who did not know about or understand the health and safety issues on the ferries. That was part of the problem as well, because P&O took away the people who knew what to do and replaced them with people who, with great respect, did not have the same ability.

The hon. Gentleman makes an excellent point, and that is why it is important that we have skilled workers who need be regarded for their loyalty to the job, and for their competence.

Call me cynical, but it seems that certain policies can be expedited over others, such as the Home Office having no difficulty in swiftly implementing the inhumane Rwanda policy or the Government pushing to break international law, or selling off the popular and successful Channel 4.

Does my hon. Friend not think that part of the problem for the Government of the moment is that, if they try to expedite fire and rehire while we are trying to fire the current Prime Minister, they will unfortunately have to rehire him on worse terms and we will all suffer?

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point and with a great deal of wit.

While the Government can do all the things that I have outlined, it seems that supporting workers’ rights has been abandoned at the bottom of the pile. It is not a priority for this Government, who seem to value their own job security above that of the average working person.

What does the Prime Minister expect from our great British workforce? Under this Government, are workers just meant to put up and shut up about their inadequate pay, conditions and benefits, without having adequate legal protections? Thankfully, due to the excellent work of unions such as Unite, Unison, GMB, the Transport Salaried Staffs Association or TSSA, the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers or RMT, ASLEF and others, there is some support and respite from fire and rehire for employees. However, without legislation, I fear that this practice will persist.

It is clear that we need to outlaw fire and rehire. We do not need some sort of consultation but to outlaw it and urgently introduce a Bill to strengthen workers’ rights. Lip service will not stop fire and rehire; an effective ban will. However, Government plans on a statutory code fall woefully short and even then the Government are struggling to implement the bare minimum required. Current Government proposals would mean that the practice of fire and rehire remains legal, consultation procedures would not be improved and workers would continue to be dismissed for not agreeing to an inferior contract. Quite simply, all that that will achieve is to increase a company’s financial calculation before it uses fire and rehire tactics regardless.

We already know that the Government plans do not work. P&O Ferries calculated that it was financially worthwhile foregoing consultations, despite knowing that they were necessary, before cutting almost 800 jobs and replacing those employees with agency workers. P&O’s chief executive said:

The hon. Gentleman and I walked to this debate together from the main Chamber, where there is severe trade union bashing going on from the Government side. Is that not the reality of the current Government, namely that they are too busy bashing trade unions, not working with them?

The hon. Gentleman makes an excellent point. That issue is exactly what we discussed as we made our way from the main Chamber into Westminster Hall. The Government are trying to pick a fight with unions rather than dealing with issues or coming to the negotiating table. For example, the hugely disruptive rail strikes, which will have an enormous impact on many of us, could have been resolved by now if Rail Ministers actually done the job that they were supposed to do.

As I was saying, quite frankly the Prime Minister has job security that employees can only dream of. Put simply, fire and rehire is not a negotiating tactic but a direct threat to workers, it has no place in our modern Great Britain, and the Government should be ashamed that fire and rehire has been allowed to proliferate on their watch.

I hope that the Minister has some good news for the thousands of people who have been affected by this abhorrent tactic, and for the millions more who could be at risk from it. It is disappointing that not a single Conservative colleague—apart from the Minister—has come to speak for their constituents. We should be acting in cross-party solidarity to battle against fire and rehire on our constituents’ behalf, and to press Ministers to finally introduce legislation.

We should have working standards that we are proud of and that celebrate our country’s fantastic workforce, but the Government seem intent on a race to the bottom when it comes to workers’ rights. Warm words will not do it any more; clear-cut legislation will.

Order. As you all know, we will need to get to the Front-Bench speakers a little over half an hour before the end of the debate, at around 3.28 pm, but I will not put a limit on speeches as it does not seem that we need one.

Thank you very much indeed, Ms McVey; it is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship. I congratulate the hon. Member for Slough (Mr Dhesi) on securing the debate and on opening it so well.

I have had quite a lot to do with the Minister recently. Although I have specific views on the lack of an employment Bill, I pay tribute to him for the constructive way in which he is working with me and my colleagues to ensure that we get neonatal leave and pay in statute—we have been pushing on that matter for a while. I thank my own trade union, Unite, for its helpful briefing in advance of the debate, and I will come back to a number of points on that.

I will not press this point too much given that you are in the Chair, Ms McVey—I know that you are quite an influential member of the Blue Collar Conservatives—but as the hon. Member for Slough was speaking, I was reflecting on the fact that workers’ rights are something that Blue Collar Conservatives should think about. There is no doubt that the British political landscape has changed significantly on workers’ rights. People on this side of the Chamber, and indeed people in Scotland, may not be happy about it, but there is no doubt that the Conservative-voting demographic has changed significantly, and it would be rather foolhardy of Conservative Members—particularly those who represent red wall seats—to overlook blue collar workers who have sadly been subjected to fire and rehire practices. I would not be so bold as to indicate, for the purposes of Hansard, whether the Chair is nodding.

It was interesting that during the Brexit referendum, people were regularly told that Brexit was about taking back control. I happen to believe that Brexit was a bad idea—I still believe that it was largely about deregulation and a bonfire of workers’ rights—but I reserved a degree of judgment post-2016, and the jury is still out on whether the Government take workers’ rights seriously.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms McVey. Fire and rehire is wrong. I know it, everyone here knows it, workers know it, the Government know it, the Prime Minister knows it, and the Minister knows it, too.

Fire and rehire is unfair. It levels down; it is about deregulation and a continual rolling back of workers’ rights and an attack on trade unions. There is not a constituency in the land in which this pernicious and cruel practice has not happened or is not on the verge of happening, with worse terms and conditions held over workers’ heads as a constant threat, keeping them awake at night.

The vile way in which P&O workers were treated recently, handcuffed by private security and marched from their workplace, left me disgusted and angry. The route we are heading in with this Government and workers’ rights means we need to take this seriously. Whether it be fire and rehire, zero-hours contracts or the constant insecurity of those in the workplace, the Government do not care about the plight of working people. If they did, they would have legislated against this damaging practice already and, at the very least, have produced the long-awaited and 20-times promised employment Bill.

If any of my former Conservative colleagues were here, they could correct me, but I hope they agree that the practice makes no sense from economic stance. If we do not stop this abhorrent practice, rogue bosses at firms affecting my constituents, such as British Gas, British Airways, Go North West buses and Asda, aiming to save a few quid with fire and rehire will leave us all to pay. If people end up on lower wages, they will have to claim more social security, such as universal credit. Instead of companies paying for redundancies, it ends with the taxpayer bailing out the companies.

As much as the Government like to preach about work being the best way out of poverty, that cannot be when the majority of people claiming benefits are in work. There is only one winner with fire and rehire, and it is not the workers or their families. It is greedy bosses who continually ride roughshod over working people.