Work and Families Bill

I listened with particular care to the contributions of Opposition Members. I was pleased that my hon. Friend the Member for Burnley (Kitty Ussher) listed the approaches that they had taken in recent years on the range of employment legislation that has been introduced. It was enlightening and very different from several of the contributions that have been made. I want to talk about the context for the measure. I was a lawyer before I entered the House of Commons. I worked in law centres, mainly advising low-paid and non-unionised employees about their employment rights. Statutory employment rights were important to that group, as they did not have the benefit of strong contractual terms and conditions. One of my clients was a security guard in his 30s, with a young family. He came to see me after he had worked for nine months without a day off and asked whether he had a right to annual leave and time off. I had to advise him that he had no rights because the then Government did not want to introduce the social chapter. His only rights were those he had negotiated with his employer and at that time the security industry was, to a large extent, non-unionised. I had to tell him that his rights were minimal. Good employers have always recognised the right to annual leave and time off, but bad employers have not. That gentleman, whose name was Andy, had to wait until 1998 when we introduced the working time regulations, which gave the right to annual leave and a limit to the working week. It is outrageous that less than 10 years ago a person could have been in his position. Since 1997, the Government have been committed to fairness at work, which includes recognition of the need for not only economic efficiency but social justice in the workplace. As I said earlier, I am very pleased that we had read into the record a list of the legislation that the Conservative party has opposed since 1997, including rights in respect of annual leave, flexibility in the workplace, part-time workers and extended maternity leave.