HC Deb 22 May 1962 vol 660 cc397-406

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Peel.]

11.39 p.m.

Mr. Robert Edwards (Bilston)

I am grateful for the opportunity in this Adjournment debate to deal with a small Crown Colony—Aden—on the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula. It is one of the smallest of the territories under the control of the Colonial Office, its population is only 150,000 and it is a long way from this country, but there are problems affecting the industrial workers of the Colony which should be discussed in this House.

It is not my intention at this late hour to deal with the large political issues involved in the Middle East. All I want to say is that if we consider Aden to be an important part of our strategic defence of the Middle East, it is clear to me that if that defence is to be real we must have the good will of the people in the Colony. At the moment we are losing that good will. We are turning thousands of industrial workers sour. We are creating anti-British propaganda that is sweeping the Middle East because in the sheikdoms from the Trucial Coast to the hinterlands of Aden we still consider we can apply the old, outmoded colonial policy that died years before the end of the war.

Aden has not to be considered as we consider Muscat and Oman or some of the little sheikdoms up the Trucial Coast. Here is a very large concentration of industrial workers, and there is a state of tremendous industrial unrest among them. They are strongly organised in trade unions. These are not Communist unions. They are trade unions affiliated to the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions, to which the British Trades Union Congress is affiliated. Yet these trade unionists are denied the right to withhold their labour to defend their own day-to-day interests.

The Legislative Council of Aden, under the pressure of the Colonial Office, has maintained an industrial relations ordinance which makes striking illegal. If there is one principle which separates us from totalitarian 'countries, it is that we believe that working men and women should, if their negotiations reach deadlock, have the right to withhold their labour. When industrial workers are denied the right to withhold their labour in the interests of their living standards, they are denied elementary freedom. That means that they are living under a dictatorship, and democracy becomes a farce.

Over the last few months I have asked many Questions about the situation in Aden. On 27th February I asked the Secretary of State for the Colonies if he will make a statement on the state of unrest in the Aden Colony which has led to the threat of a general strike. The reply I received was: I am advised by the Governor that there is no such unrest or threat of a general strike. The same day I asked the same Minister why the general secretary of the Technical and General Workers' Union in Aden had been arrested. The reply was that he was arrested for inciting a strike in contravention of the Industrial Relations Ordinance. The same day I asked why the president of the Aden Refinery Workers' Union had been arrested. The reply was that he was arrested for Inciting a strike in contravention of the Industrial Relations Ordinance."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 27th February, 1962; Vol. 654, c. 124–5.] On that very same day we were informed in this House that, according to the Governor, there was no such unrest and no threat of a general strike. If there is no unrest, why are two leading officials of two major unions arrested and imprisoned, charged with inciting the workers to strike?

Two leaders of the Aden trade union movement are serving terms of imprisonment of twenty-three months and another is serving ten months. Hundreds have been fined. Thousands, even in such a small Colony as this, have been dismissed for union activities. How is it possible to create harmony? How is it possible to maintain any kind of a strategic defence in the Middle East from an area where the whole population is being turned hostile to the Legislative Council and to the British Government?

I am not making frivolous charges. The I.C.F.T.U. discussed this matter and sent a deputation to Aden. It consisted of two members of the Executive Council, and they met the Governor. They were so appalled by the situation that they protested to the I.L.O. The nature of their protest was that the ordinance relating to industrial relations was a violation of the I.L.O. Charter as it related to free collective bargaining and the right of workers to join unions of their choice. They protested that the journal of the Aden T.U.C. had been suspended, so that the workers had no voice. They protested that hundreds of workers at that time had been dismissed only because they were trade unionists.

They asked the British Government to intervene in Aden so that the ban on the union paper would be lifted and the ordinance modified so that democratic trade unionism could function again. They asked that the trade unionists who had lost their jobs in the public service should be reinstated, and that the Government should also invite the private employers to reinstate workers dismissed only because they were trade unionists.

Of this very small Colony of 150,000 people, 4,000 are Europeans. There is great concentration of industrial workers in the ports, because this was a great coaling port, occupied by the British in 1830 during the period when we needed to keep our trade with India free. A very large number of workers are still engaged in the ports. There is a large British refinery employing 2,500 workers. There are a rubber processing industry, a plastic industry, and by-product industries. There is a very large industrial population, reckoned as a percentage of the total.

When a large number of industrial workers occupy the same kind of employment, it is a natural development that they should get together and form trade unions to defend their position and advance their living standards. This has happened everywhere in the world. No repressive measures or ordinances can prevent the development of trade unions, and this ordinance in this British Colony has been imposed to deny the right of industrial workers through their unions to withdraw their labour when their claim for a decent wage advance has been denied.

There was a token strike in the refinery after twenty-three months of negotiations which were abortive. Is there anything wrong with that? Is it a crime for workers, frustrated after so many months of negotiation, to withdraw their labour? The right to withdraw labour is a right which was won after generations of struggle by the industrial workers of this country. I said in a supplementary question in the House the other day that Cairo Radio was calling these men the Tolpuddle Martyrs of Arabia, and all over the Middle East these men are becoming martyrs.

Who knows better than we do that all history, ancient and modern, has proved that When men become martyrs, they become leaders, that ideals cannot be destroyed by suppressive measures, that the status of a leader is not lowered by putting him in gaol? This stupid method of destroying a movement has been tried all over the world and all over the old British Empire and has failed. Do we not learn any lessons from the past?

Only last year there was a delegation from the Trades Union Congress of Aden to the British Trades Union Congress. Those two bodies held a joint meeting with the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions in London and that joint meeting asked the British Government to have another look at the situation in Aden to see what could be done to wipe out this ordinance and lift the ban on the trade union journal, but nothing has been done.

The situation is becoming more dangerous every day. In 1957, 2,060 days were lost through industrial disputes. In 1958, the figure was 7,000 days and in 1960 there were 87 separate industrial disputes in this little Colony. Even now, although it is a criminal offence to come out on strike, there have been token strikes and on 11th May, this very month, there was a general strike in Aden.

The Government ought to reconsider this situation to see what can be done to have a new beginning and to create a new atmosphere in Aden so that the trade unions can operate effectively and peacefully and democratically. This can be done only by bringing all the elements involved together in a conference and by promising to wipe out this ordinance which cannot be justified in any democratic Parliament, and by lifting the ban on the trade union journal, a ban which cannot be excused in a free society which claims that its freedom is based on the right of the workers to join a trade union of their choice and to withdraw their labour if negotiations fail, the right of a free Press and the right of free assembly. Those rights are denied the industrial workers of Aden and unless those elementary democratic rights are won back, there will be trouble in this little Colony, trouble which all decent people want to avoid.

I hope that the Under-Secretary will give us some assurance that the Government will look at this situation again so that the whole affair can be reviewed with a view to easing the tension which can be reduced only if trade unionists are given their due rights.

11.55 p.m.

The Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies (Mr. Hugh Fraser)

The hon. Member for Bilston (Mr. R. Edwards) has been very vigilant on these matters. I welcome the vigilance of the House on this matter of trade union relationships in Aden, but I must say that some of the statements made by the hon. Gentleman are wide of the mark. He talked about many being imprisoned, about hundreds being fined, and about thousands being dismissed. There are wild exaggerations. During the period to which the hon. Gentleman referred, 16 persons were fined for taking part in the recent building strike, the secretary of one union was sentenced to two years' imprisonment—but mainly on a charge of sedition, for attempting to bring down the Government—13 others were committed to prison, and five others were bound over. Also, 30 members of the Forces Union are being summoned as a result of the last 48-hour strike which the hon. Gentleman referred to as a general strike, which again is untrue.

I disagree with the hon. Gentleman when he says that labour relations have deteriorated. On the contrary, labour relations over the period that we have been discussing since the introduction of this ordinance have greatly improved. In October, 1961, there was a building strike; in December, 1961, two short strikes at the B.P. refinery and in April and May, 1962, there were two short strikes by the Forces Union, to which I have already referred. The International Labour Organisation carried out an investigation to see whether the ordinance to which I shall refer in the main body of my speech was in order with Convention 98, that is, with the right to organise collective bargaining, and came to the conclusion that it was, and that it was not incompatible with this Convention. Therefore, what the hon. Gentleman said about the I.L.O. being opposed to the ordinance is not true.

I should like to discuss with the House the reason for imposing this ordinance in Aden. The main object of it is to see whether we can work out a harmonious relationship between both sides of industry in Aden. This may seem an odd way of going about it, to control and insist on arbitration, but by the end of 1959—and trade unions only started in a big way in Aden in the middle 1950s—in spite of visits from trade unionists in this country, which we welcomed, the situation had got to such a pitch that voluntary bargaining and co-operation between the two sides was not, functioning at all. Indeed, in 1957 and 1958 there had been 37 strikes; in 1959 and the first half of 1960 there were 118 strikes; and of the 84 strikes in 1959, 68 took place before any dispute was reported to the Labour Department at all.

As the hon. Member said, there are political undertones in this matter and, of course, industrial relationships are bedevilled to some extent by local politics. We thought that in view of the serious worsening of industrial relations and the threat to the general progress of the Colony an attempt should be made to put these matters in order. In consequence, in 1960 a special adviser on industrial relations, Mr. Fallows, a former British trade union official with forty-two years' experience in the movement, went out to investigate.

After spending three months in the Colony trying to obtain, without much success, the co-operation of union leaders, Mr. Fallows submitted a report from which I would like to quote his main conclusion. He said: Freedom to combine as well as to enjoy immunity from legal process for otherwise tortious acts, has placed in the hands of the trade unions of Aden a power of such magnitude that the community can be held almost to ransom and at the same time be used as an instrument to coerce and undermine Government. However charitably one may be inclined to regard this young trade union movement it is impossible to avoid the conclusion that this freedom to combine and their immunity at law seems to be regarded by them as a licence to strike on the slightest pretext and if order is to be brought to the industrial relations in the Colony all concerned must conform to good industrial practice and live and work within the framework of normal negotiating processes. The key passage of Mr. Fallows' report was as follows: I am convinced that steps must be taken to prevent by suitable restrictive legislation the present easy access by the trade unions to the strike weapon. This is why this ordinance of 1960 was drawn up.

Mr. G. M. Thomson (Dundee, East)

Is there not a difference between announcing that there may be some sort of restriction and going ahead with an outright ban making all strikes illegal? Would it not be good to have a cooling-off period?

Mr. Fraser

It is an exaggeration for the hon. Gentleman to say that all strikes are illegal. This is not true. What was aimed at was to bring in this enactment, based on this experienced trade unionist's advice, and to set up an independent tribunal—the Industrial Court—to which labour disputes not settled voluntarily must be brought for compulsory arbitration, and it imposed certain restrictions on the right to strike and to lock out.

The legislation emphatically does not ban all strikes. This is an important point. First, strikes are not illegal in industries Where wages councils are created; secondly, they are not illegal where the Crown as employer is not prepared to accept arbitration in disputes; thirdly, they are not illegal if in the opinion of the Industrial Court an employer tries to take advantage of the men's inability to strike and does not negotiate in good faith; and, lastly, and most important, they are not illegal where a collective agreement has been concluded, providing satisfactory arrangements for the settlement of disputes between the parties, and has been registered with the Industrial Court.

It is perfectly true to say that as a result of this legislation there has been a notable increase in the number of agreements which have been made by the employers and by the unions. But although a considerable number—I think ten—of the major unions have concluded such agreements they are not prepared for political reasons to bring them before the Industrial Court and register them. If they would do this they would, of course, make their Whole situation infinitely easier. It is my appeal tonight that they should do this and so enormously ease the burden of their own problems by registering the agreements which in many cases they have reached.

I think that this provision is an entirely constructive one. Any trade union can throw off the restriction and gain complete freedom of industrial action simply by concluding an agreement with provisions for the settlement of a dispute, which many have done, and submitting it to the Industrial Court and obtaining a certificate. Although the procedure for obtaining a certificate is simple and straightforward, a union cannot be deprived of a certificate once it is obtained unless its conduct can be shown to be of such a nature that it should be withdrawn. That can be done only by a full-scale board of inquiry. This means that the gateway to complete trade union freedom is an easy one to go through, but once gained complete trade union freedom cannot easily be again restricted.

It is completely open to the trade unions in Aden if they wish to register agreements with the Industrial Court. In one respect trade unionists in Aden might be said to be even more safeguarded than in this country. This is one of the peculiarities of the situation, for the fact is that certain aspects of trade union law there are even stronger in the protection of the individual than here. When I heard the hon. Member saying that people had been dismissed for trade union action, I thought that that was totally untrue, for there is a special provision in the law there that a man cannot be dismissed if he is merely asking people to join a trade union. If he were dismissed from employment for that it would be an illegal act under this ordinance.

Although there are difficulties, I believe that this legislation has been helpful in Aden. It has certainly reduced the number of strikes. It has led to the conclusion of quite a number of agreements and we hope that in the not too distant future we shall be able to look at the whole matter again in the light of what is happening. It must, however, be in the light of a reasonable attitude by the leaders of the trade union movement in Aden. They must not rely on using the strike weapon and the trade union movement—which, as an industrial movement, is fully protected—as a political movement in an attempt to overturn an elected Government.

There are immense complications in the Aden situation, complications in that more than half those employed come from outside Aden and are not citizens. There have to be special provisions to make sure that there is industrial order and if there is co-operation there can be complete freedom. It may be that the time is approaching when confidence between the employer and employed will grow to the point where normal industrial processes can be fully accepted by both sides and the special restrictions of the 1960 ordinance may no longer be necessary.

We must allow this decision to be left to those in charge of the situation in Aden. The position is open to those who wish to conduct their union affairs in an orderly fashion. Since the ordinance there has been a great advance in claims accepted. I have seen a complaint by the chamber of commerce that some of the awards have been far too high—

The Question having been proposed after Ten o'clock on Tuesday evening and the debate having continued for half an hour, Mr. SPEAKER adjourned the House without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.

Adjourned at nine minutes past Twelve o'clock.