My Lords, I greatly welcome the measure introduced by the Minister, particularly the reduction in the number of people involved in running this operation. This will presumably result in better value for money in what is produced by the Gangmasters Licensing Authority. However, considering that originally—and, probably, even now—the expenditure was supposed to be recovered from the applicants, will this mean that the cost of the licences will now reduce? I do not know whether the GLA was successful in that regard. It might well have had a shortfall but, as the Minister mentioned, it certainly issued a great many licences over the period.
Originally, the GLA appeared to have only one set fee in obtaining a licence, and I wonder whether the new body will be allowed to differentiate at all between large and small employers. This is a topic that I have followed on and off for some time, and one of the interesting things is the range of activities that the GLA covers. The Explanatory Memorandum states that the GLA issues licences to businesses supplying labour in connection with agriculture, and the gathering of wild animals and wild plants. The Minister mentioned this in her introduction, but it may not be immediately obvious to Members of the Committee that apparently the gathering of wild plants includes forestry, and therefore the whole forestry industry seems to be brought into the regulations.
The particular issue that I came across was that many of the people who come to work in forestry are single, individual contractors. For example, I came across a fencer. In fencing it is much better to have two people, but as an independent contractor he would ask someone to come along and cut branches off the trees along the path of the fence he was building. If that person, however, finished his work and stopped to pick up a hammer in order to help the fencer, a gangmaster’s licence would be needed. The distinguishing feature is that if you are in charge of equipment, you are not part of a gang. The minute you become involved in manual labour for someone else, a gangmaster’s licence is required. I should be grateful to know how this has progressed and whether there will be any discretion under the new body to tailor the way in which it applies the regulations.
5.15 pm