HC Deb 28 June 1994 vol 245 cc671-2
8. Dr. Goodson-Wickes

To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what estimates he has made of the number of United Kingdom workers who would be affected by a statutory reduction in the working week to 35 hours.

Mr. David Hunt

The estimate is 14.75 million.

Dr. Goodson-Wickes

I thank my right hon. Friend for his reply, which could not demonstrate more clearly the wisdom of the Government's robust rejection of the social chapter. Will he give the House an assurance that he will continue to reject the current conditions of that chapter, knowing the catastrophic effect that they would have on the success of British companies? That fact seems to have escaped the unreformed socialist party, in the shape of the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull, East (Mr. Prescott).

Mr. Hunt

I give my hon. Friend that categorical assurance, and add that when the 48-hour working time directive originally came from the Commission it was designed to compel people to work no more than 48 hours a week. Mr. Ford, a member of the European Parliament on the Opposition side—

Mr. Prescott

We are not the Opposition there.

Mr. Hunt

Mr. Ford, who is from the Labour party, said that he would like to see—[Interruption.] Will the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull, East calm down for a moment and recognise that Mr. Ford has argued that instead of a 48-hour week there should be a 35-hour week right across the European Union? [Interruption.] I hear several voices approving that idea. That would mean telling 14.75 million people in the United Kingdom that they would no longer be allowed to work the hours that they chose. It would also impose costs of £20,000 million on industry, as well as a compulsory pay cut of £20,000 million.

Mrs. Clwyd

Will the Secretary of State, therefore, tell us why 68 per cent. of those at work in the United Kingdom are forced to work the longest working week in Europe to earn a decent living wage? Those are not the hours that they want to work; they can earn a decent wage only in that way. Will the right hon. Gentleman confirm that since 1979, British income per head has fallen from the European average to below the European average? Will he remind us which party has been in government since 1979?

Mr. Hunt

I have two points in answer to that three-pronged question. First, in the United Kingdom, the average working week is just less than the average working week in the European Union. Secondly, let us look at take-home pay. I have here the latest table for European countries, which I am very willing to place in the Library, which shows annual take-home pay in Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development countries in 1991. For a single person, take-home pay in the United Kingdom was the second highest in the whole of the European Union.