Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill

My Lords, in Committee a number of noble Lords expressed our concern about confidentiality in settlement agreements and the inability of these agreements to be raised at an employment tribunal in the future. We felt that this was a totally wrong direction for the Government to proceed in. The worst aspect of this would amount to what we consider to be a charter for bullies. As the legislation currently stands, despite the attempts to introduce a number of amendments, which were rejected by the Government, there is no protection. We believe that this is a thoroughly unsatisfactory approach that will be detrimental to basic employment rights in relation to potentially unfair dismissal. It is on those grounds that we seek to test the opinion of the House.