My Lords, I thank the Minister for her explanatory statement. I did not find that it addressed all the issues of concern that my noble friend Lord Grantchester has already enunciated. I declare my interest as the acting chair of
the Ethical Trading Initiative, the organisation that probably drove the previous legislation, along with the trade unions and corporates that were involved at the time. Understandably, we have a significant interest in the current proposal.
We feel that the general direction of travel during the past few years has been to make the GLA a bit more biddable to the Government’s agenda, including a focus on enforcement, possibly to the detriment of licensing and standards-setting work, which is widely acknowledged as having been important in driving a change in attitudes in the industry. It is often stated that it was a part of the Government’s Red Tape Challenge in its early days to consider whether to dissolve the GLA as a burden to business. I hope that the Government have moved away from that.
The noble Duke, the Duke of Montrose, talked about better value for money. It depends on how you assess that value for money: whether we are talking about just the cost to business of providing the scheme or about whether potential employees in these industries are still being adequately protected. We know that a lot of the risks have not gone away. I do not profess to be knowledgeable about the forestry industry; I am more familiar with the meat-processing and shellfish industries. We need to be careful about how we assess value for money.
I share the views of my noble friend Lord Grantchester about the move from Defra to the Home Office and his feeling that it will focus attention on enforcement and prosecution. While we do not regard that as unimportant, there is a concern that it will be to the detriment of standards-setting and best practice development. I would welcome the Minister’s comments on that, because we think that prevention, rather than dealing with the symptoms through prosecution, is just as important. We know that the risk is still there and in some ways has an impact on modern slavery, of which we have had examples in these industries. We should not be under any illusions about the level of risk. We may not have had a Morecambe Bay tragedy—and thank goodness for that—but we have had other tragedies of individuals being held more or less in a situation of bondage or slavery, with passports confiscated, living in terrible conditions and not even being paid minimum wages. We should not forget that.
I listened carefully to what was said about the size of the board. If we are changing to a board of nine, it is legitimate to ask whether there will be a sufficient skill set in the way that my noble friend has suggested.
I want also to ask about the advisory committees that are referred to in the consultation document, which states that,
“this instrument permits the Board to establish advisory committees. Unlike the existing stakeholder liaison groups, the measure introduced in this instrument obliges the Board to pay due regard to the advisory committees findings and recommendations”.
Can the Minister give any more detail on “pay due regard”? Will the board publish the recommendations of the advisory committees and will we be able to see how the Gangmasters Licensing Authority reacts to them? That is important, because it is inevitable that the committees will raise the concerns of stakeholders in those industries.
By having the right type of legislation and a body with a statutory mandate, positive lessons have come out of the GLA experience for tackling deep-rooted practices such as labour abuse. I am not sure how one would tackle modern-day slavery across different industry sectors without bodies such as the GLA.
On the review process, I notice that the Explanatory Memorandum states that there is no need for an impact assessment because there will be no changes that merit it. Nevertheless, this is a fundamental change to the operation of the Gangmasters Licensing Authority. Will the Minister reflect on the suggestions made by my noble friend Lord Grantchester? If she is not prepared to go quite so far as he suggested today, will she consider the need for a review process before a triennial review given the change that is taking place?
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