Industrial Relations Act (Hansard, 4 July 1972)

§ 9. Mr. Ashton
asked the Secretary of State for Employment if he will now carry out a review of the workings of the Industrial Relations Act.

§ 10. Mr. Molloy
asked the Secretary of State for Employment if he will specify what he has learnt as a result of the working of the Industrial Relations Act.

§ 11. Mr. Orme
asked the Secretary of State for Employment if he is satisfied with the working of the Industrial Relations Act; and if he will make a statement.

§ 13. Mr. Ashley
asked the Secretary of State for Employment if he remains satisfied with the working of the Industrial Relations Act, in the light of the latest developments in the docks dispute; and if he will make a statement.

14. Mr. Ted Fletcher
asked the Secretary of State for Employment what discussions he has now had with the Trades Union Congress on the operation of the Industrial Relations Act.

§ Mr. Maurice Macmillan
It is much too early to judge the long-term effects of the Act after only four months. But there are already plenty of individual workers who have benefited from its provisions; managements in consultations with unions are already improving their policies and practices in the light of the Act and the code of practice. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister and I discussed the operation of the Act with the TUC on 26th April and we shall be doing so again later today.

§ Mr. Ashton
When is the Act supposed to start working? Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the number of working days lost per month is four times what it was before the Act was passed? In view of the great distress to the public caused by the number of days lost, is it not apparent that the right hon. Gentleman has created a Frankenstein which he can no longer control?

§ Mr. Macmillan
The hon. Gentleman has produced a fallacious argument. What he is referring to are the extra working days lost caused by the miners' strike. There have in fact been fewer strikes than before.

§ Mr. Ashley
Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that if the Government could not judge the long-term effects of the Act they should never have passed it in the first place? Is he aware, further, that the only people who will benefit 225 from it are our overseas competitors, because the Act has made an already difficult situation worse? Since the Act will be repealed sooner or later by a Labour Government, why does not the right hon. Gentleman repeal it sooner and claim some credit for it?

§ Mr. Macmillan
I do not accept that the Act makes matters more difficult. Naturally in estimating the future of the Act I can tell the hon. Gentleman that we expect it to be wholly beneficial to the country and to the unions. But it is asking too much to judge the long-term results on the basis of four months' performance.

§ Mr. Kenneth Lewis
Does not my right hon. Friend agree that it is a sheer waste of time in the present situation to discuss this Act and its effects, since it is there in any event? Should not we be better employed in trying to get agreement on a proper prices and incomes policy, which would be of advantage to the £ in present circumstances?

§ Mr. Macmillan
As my hon. Friend knows, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister made it clear yesterday that the Government hope to get full co-operation from the TUC and the CBI with a view to improving the machinery of negotiation and conciliation. I do not know whether it is worth discussing the Act, but certainly it will remain on the Statute Book.

§ Mr. Molloy
Some time ago the right hon. Gentleman said that he had learnt something from the Act, though he did not specify what. From his replies today one can only conclude that in educational parlance he is a very late developer. In the interests of good industrial relations, will the right hon. Gentleman add to his nomenclature not only wage and salary norms but profit norms? Will he stop treating people who work by hand and brain to create the nation's wealth as being outside the British community, and in the interests of the nation as a whole will he suspend this ridiculous Act?

§ Mr. Macmillan
It is precisely because we regard those who work by hand and brain as being wholly within the community that we think that their associations should, like others in the community, operate within the framework of the law.

§ Mr. Simeons
Is it not as illogical to suggest that the Industrial Relations Act is the cause of poor industrial relations, as the Labour Party does, as to suggest that the divorce reform legislation which right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite introduced is the cause of unhappy marriages?

§ Mr. Macmillan
My hon. Friend has produced rather an apt simile. Certainly it is the intention of the Industrial Relations Act that recourse to the courts should be a matter of last resort and not first resort, and, as in domestic life, conciliation is appropriate in industrial relations.

§ Mr. Orme
If the right hon. Gentleman states that he is not in a position to report on the success or otherwise of the Industrial Relations Act since it has operated for only four months, God help us when he gives a 12-month report on it, assuming that it remains in force. When the right hon. Gentleman talks about improved industrial relations, is he aware that in the engineering industry there is no negotiating machinery at the moment and that that situation has been brought about in many cases by the engineering employers supporting the Government's approach, especially on the status quo? What will the right hon. Gentleman do if the law is brought into the engineering industry through the Industrial Relations Court? He is in for a lot of trouble if that happens.

§ Mr. Macmillan
The dispute in the engineering industry is a matter between the unions. It has nothing to do with the Act. I repeat that it is impossible to judge the long-term effects of the Industrial Relations Act after four months. As one of its main purposes is to change attitudes over a period of time, I have no doubt that, judging from the considerable change in attitude among management and unions so far produced, it will be wholly successful.

§ Mr. Rost
Is my right hon. Friend aware that a large number of rank and file trade unionists regard the Act as fair, especially those who have sought and obtained justice from it as a result of making claims about unfair dismissal and other unfair practices?

§ Mr. Macmillan
I have no doubt that many trade unionists regard the Act as 227 being very fair, especially to the individual. I remind hon. Members that those who criticise the Act did not have much time for Donovan, either.

Mr. Fletcher
In view of the appalling figures announced today that over 14 million days have been lost in industrial disputes, does the right hon. Gentleman realise that the best contribution he can make to improving industrial relations is to assure the TUC that he will put the Act into cold storage?

§ Mr. Macmillan
With respect to the hon. Gentleman, that is an almost wholly irrelevant remark. Of the 14 million days lost, 10 million were lost in the coal strike before the Act was in operation.

§ Mr. Waddington
After yesterday's debate, is my right hon. Friend clear whether it is the policy of the Opposition now to amend the Industrial Relations Act or to repeal it? To put it mildly, was not there a startling difference between the speech of the Leader of the Opposition and that of the right hon. Member for East Ham, North (Mr. Prentice), who wound up yesterday's debate for the Opposition?

§ Mr. Macmillan
One's view about whether right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite, assuming they were ever to come to office, would repeal or amend the Act depends upon whether one listened to the first speech yesterday or the last but one.

§ Mr. Prentice
I resist the temptation to comment on that schoolboy debating point. Will the right hon. Gentleman confirm that one of the main dangers to which we referred in yesterday' debate was that of the country being plunged into a national docks strike by accident? Is not that danger strengthened by the news today that the Midland Cold Storage Company has taken action against seven shop stewards, some of whom were concerned in the Chobham Farm dispute? If the right hon. Gentleman will not repeal the Act, will he not at least make a public appeal to dock employers to stop playing the fool and to keep these cases out of court while talks are going on between the unions and representatives of the employers to try to solve the real problems in the docks?

§ Mr. Macmillan
I agree that while the Aldington-Jones Committee is working 228 very hard to solve the real problems in the docks, the greatest possible restraint should be used. I apply that to both sides—unions and employers. A great deal of restraint is required if the temperature is to be kept down in these difficult times. But I do not regard this as a one-sided responsibility. As for the specific case to which the right hon. Gentleman referred, I understand there may be a hearing tomorrow.