§ 8. Mr. Gwilym Robertsasked the Minister of Labour if he will take steps to, introduce a sliding scale of redundancy payments to cover workers who are made redundant after employment for a period of less than two years.
§ Mr. GunterNo, Sir.
§ Mr. RobertsWould not my right hon. Friend agree, however, that the present demarcation system tends to produce a pool of labour which drifts from one job to another in times of recession? Is he aware that one A.E.U. branch in Luton has told me that it has had members made redundant as many as eight times in the last couple of years?
§ Mr. GunterI am not aware of the circumstances which my hon. Friend has outlined, but he will know that there were great arguments about the length of period for redundancy payments at the time of the legislation. Certain employers' associations wanted it to be five years and I remember the great arguments of the party opposite for making it three years. We decided that it should be two years, and I think that that is the proper length of time.