HC Deb 20 January 1976 vol 903 cc1114-5
4. Mr. Gow

asked the Secretary of State for Employment how many industries in the public sector operate, or are planning to operate, closed shop agreements for new entrants.

Mr. Foot

My Department does not require employers to notify information about the terms of any collective agreements they may reach on union membership. However, I am aware of five industries in the public sector where it has been agreed, or where there are firm proposals for an agreement, that it should be a condition of employment for new recruits to some grades to join a union within a specific period.

Mr. Gow

Will the Secretary of State tell the House what are those five industries? With his long and honourable record as a libertarian, will he take this opportunity of acknowledging that it is a serious erosion of individual freedom to make it a pre-condition of employment that a person should join a trade union?

Mr. Foot

The five public sector industries in which it is known that closed shop agreements have been or are about to be introduced are mining—including the new agreement with clerical staff—British Rail, affecting staff below management grades, including professional, technical and research staff; British Gas, affecting manual workers; the electricity supply industry, affecting manual workers; and the Post Office, in which an agreement has yet to be concluded.

I fully appreciate that the establishment of closed shops raises questions of the rights of the individuals as well as of the trade union concerned. Therefore, we have had discussions with the trade union movement on how that can best be dealt with. We believe that the best and most effective way of dealing with it, in the interests not merely of the trade union movement as a whole but of the individuals concerned, is to establish the tribunal which the TUC has proposed. The sooner we get it into operation the better it will be.