HEALTH AND SAFETY AT WORK ETC. BILL

HL Deb 04 July 1974 vol 353 cc350-67

3.20 p.m.

THE MINISTER OF STATE, SCOTTISH OFFICE (LORD HUGHES)

My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now resolve itself into Committee on this Bill.

Moved, that the House do now resolve itself into Committee.—(Lord Hughes.)

On Question, Motion agreed to.

House in Committee accordingly.

[The EARL OF LISTOWEL in the Chair]

Clause 1 agreed to.

Clause 2 [General duties of employers to their employees]:

THE EARL OF LISTOWEL

Before I call Amendment No. 1, I should point out that if the Amendment is agreed to, I cannot call Amendment No. 2.

THE EARL OF GOWRIE moved Amendment No. 1:

Page 3, line 20, leave out from ("by") to second ("of") in line 21 and insert ("employees or organisations representing employees").

The noble Earl said: I believe that it would be for the convenience of the Committee if I initiated a debate on the principle underlying not only my own Amendment but also Amendment No. 2 in the name of the noble Earl, Lord Courtown, and Amendment No. 3 in the names of the noble Baroness, Lady Seear, and the noble Lord, Lord Avebury. What my Amendment seeks to do is to increase the awareness in health and safety matters of all people at work. As your Lordships know, the Bill enjoins employers to set up safety committees at request. Such committees may only be attended by delegates appointed by recognised trade unions. In Clause 2(4), which I seek to amend, firms prescribed under regulations by the Secretary of State must have safety representatives. These representatives must be appointed by recognised trade unions and they are deemed to represent all other employees whether or not they belong to recognised trade unions.

In considering the Bill—as we are doing—under the shadow of Flixborough, it is surely of the first importance to recognise that the Bill does not to any substantial degree represent differences in political thinking between the three Parties. We are all in favour of safety and health at work and we are all anxious that the rationalisations initiated by the Robens Report should have a chance to work themselves into practice at the earliest possible moment. If they do so, they will of course play their part in reducing tragic accidents and the tariff of human suffering and economic damage which result.

In slightly different ways, the Amendments before us are concerned with what seems to me and to my noble friends on these Benches to be the one disturbing and jarring section of the Bill—that is to say, the provisions of Clause 2, which effectively restrict the appointment of employees' safety representatives to recognised trade unions. Surely this restriction is quite contrary to the spirit of the Robens Report, with its wise emphasis on the importance of worker involvement. Paragraph 64 of the Report says, We regard the question of worker-involvement as quite central to this Inquiry and to the main themes of our Report.

Surely none of us would dissent from that, particularly not the Government, concerned as they are with getting these recommendations translated into action as soon as possible, and concerned as they also are with the philosophy of worker participation. Our case is quite simple: it is that restricting the privilege—the duty, even—of appointing safety committees to recognised trade unions involves writing out of the Bill the enormous workforce which does not belong to any trade union. Of a workforce of about 24 million, only 11 million belong to recognised trade unions. This restriction also precludes the democratic selection of safety committees within firms where there is only partial unionisation—and we all know how many firms that applies to. Surely it is wrong that members of recognised trade unions should have exclusive rights of representation on safety committees when there are so many employees in all parts of the national workforce who are not unionised.

In arguing in this way, I am myself not trying to be exclusive. I think it entirely right that the trade union movement should keep up its good work in safety and health matters. I believe that, in the spirit of Robens, which seeks new and more vigorous efforts in this sphere, the trade union movement should do everything it can to deepen its involvement. I entirely agree with the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, when he said on Second Reading that the Government could not but welcome provisions in the Bill which give rights to trade unions to ensure that the voice of workpeople on the shop floor is heard on the safety and health matters which so directly and urgently affect them.

Those, in brief paraphrase, were the words of the noble Lord. It could not, in my view, have been better put. We on this side of the House want exactly the same thing, but we have not yet heard a single argument in support of making these rights exclusive. We have heard nothing of the rights of non-unionised or only partially unionised firms and we can only conclude, therefore, that the Government have imported into the Bill a piece of current trade union policy admirable in itself, as we acknowledge, but altogether to be resisted if it interferes with the rights and, as I said earlier, the obligations of others. This surely has to do with politics and not with safety and health. Health and safety matters must bridge the divide between union and non-union members. They cannot be left as they are. They must be strengthened, as this legislation demands, and, if they are to be strengthened, all employers and all employees must be directly involved in the Bill. I beg to move.

3.27 p.m.

THE EARL OF COURTOWN

With your Lordships' permission I will speak also to Amendment No. 2 standing in my name. I made the point on Second Reading that the Bill is to apply to all establishments in which people work—offices, laboratories, warehouses, as well as factories. It also applies to companies large and small, and we know from the Bolton Report that 70 per cent. of the small companies have at present no union representation at all. I do not quarrel with the proposal that where there is union representation the union should appoint the safety representative. But we also have to provide for the establishments where there is no union representation. We do not want an employer to read this Bill and to think that this part of it does not apply to him. Amendment No. 2 makes it clear that such cases will be covered by regulations made by the Secretary of State. It may be answered that in any case the Secretary of State may make regulations covering this point, but I still think that the other point which I have made is important and that nobody reading the Bill, particularly a small employer, should be allowed to believe that because he has no union representation this part of the Bill does not apply to him.

BARONESS SEEAR

With your Lordships' permission, since Amendment No. 3 is on very much the same lines as the preceding Amendments, I should like to speak very briefly to the Amendment which stands in my name and that of my noble friend Lord Avebury. The major points behind the Amendment have already been made in the speech of the noble Earl, Lord Gowrie. I should like to reiterate very briefly the two major reasons why we wish the clause to be amended as proposed. It is essential that the rank and file in industry should be able to express their point of view directly in matters of safety and that their interest should be harnessed to the working of safety committees. If this kind of employee involvement is to be at its height, elections among employees of appropriate representatives is surely the best way in which this can take place. Participation must be participation by the people who are directly involved in the plant concerned and by as many of those people as it is possible to mobilise for the purpose.

However, the second reason is equally important, though it is of a different kind. As the noble Earl, Lord Courtown, has pointed out, in fact, less than half of the people in employment in this country are in trade unions. As we all know (as does anyone who has any knowledge whatsoever of this matter), some of the worst safety conditions are in the smallest plants, in offices, in the kind of shops in which trade union organisation is very weak or non-existent. Employees in these circumstances will have no legal rights to demand that there should be any form of safety representation, safety committee, or safety inspection by an elected representative. These people will depend entirely upon the good will of their employers and their willingness voluntarily to set up such machinery. I find it difficult to believe that, for what I can only regard as a doctrinaire point, appointments are in the hands of the trade unions, and the Government wish to leave this large number of people who more than any other people need protection—because they do not have trade union representatives in their places of work to take up particular issues—without any legal rights in this matter. Because this point is of such importance and because I believe that our Amendment makes this point even more emphatically than it is made in the other two Amendments, I hope that it will be this Amendment that will ultimately find its way into the Bill.

3.33 p.m.

LORD AVEBURY

I want to add one word to the speech of my noble friend in which she has covered all the ground except for the point which I made on Second Reading, and which I do not think was ever satisfactorily replied to by the Minister. This point concerns the case of industries where, not necessarily because of the fact that the organisations are on a small scale but for completely other reasons, the unions are weak. I referred to the case which had come up the previous week and which was quoted by the Secretary of State in another place concerning the oil rigs and platforms in the North Sea, where he said that it was very difficult to organise the workers because of the nature of their employment. Yet here is an occupation in which one may think above all that there is a necessity for safety representatives and the appointment of safety committees. As your Lordships know, the operations which are conducted in the North Sea are extremely hazardous. Lives have been lost and men have been seriously injured. Under the Bill as it stands, without our Amendment, there would be no power to provide for the appointment of safety representatives and safety committees to look after the interests of the people working in such a hazardous operation. This is probably not a unique example, but it certainly illustrates and I hope reinforces the point which my noble friend has made that it is very wrong to deny for doctrinaire reasons the benefits of safety representatives to people who by reason of their occupations, and the difficulty of trade unions recruiting in those occupations, have not had the opportunity of joining a trade union.

LORD DOUGLASS OF CLEVELAND

I have heard these arguments about the rights of the individuals for so long in this House that I get rather weary. The noble Earl, Lord Gowrie, said that he had heard no arugments to justify the stand that is taken in the Bill. Surely he was in the House when we argued the Industrial Relations Act? Surely he is aware that the Leader of the Opposition at the present time has given a pledge that he will not try to reintroduce the Industrial Relations Act? Surely he has heard all the arguments with respect to the rights of individuals as propounded by his own Party, to the point where he must be tired of them?

Let us consider what happens with trade unions and responsibility. Everybody is asking that the trade unions should take responsibility in these days. When you deal with safety measures internationally at the I.L.O., do you ask for all these other organisations to come in, to go to the I.L.O. to express opinions, to take responsibility for arguing the case with the men and women in this country and to take responsibility for applying the decisions of the I.L.O.? Do you try to bring all these employees' associations into those facets of safety? If you are going to discuss matters with "Neddy", the National Economic Development Council, do you bring in all the employees' organisations to ask them to discuss what is to be done about productivity matters; what is to be done about taxation; and what is to be done about industrial relations? Is there only one respect about which the Opposition wants to bring in employees' associations which are not trade unions?

Surely if we are to have a real sense of responsibility in respect of safety and a willingness to see the regulations applied, it can be done only through organisations which have taken the responsibility locally, nationally and internationally. If other organisations are to be brought in to make decisions on these matters, at the end of the day they will not have the responsibility that is vested in the trade unions. In addition to that, there can be trades unions which have followed out and developed the safety regulations and, when they get down to applying this in the workshop, there can be a division of opinion between employees' associations and trade unions because the trades unions have an independence that the employees' associations do not have. They have the responsibility to accept the decisions of their own unions on an international, national and regional basis. To attempt to give power to people outside of that is only to confuse safety regulations when they come down to the point of impact, where they are being applied, and that is down in the workshop.

LORD POPPLEWELL

I should like to support my noble friend in his observations. It is absolutely ridiculous to say that there are no arguments against it. What is the intention of this first Amendment? It is to delete recognised trade unions within the meaning of the regulations. This goes back to the old story of the fight for trade union recognition that we have had down through the ages. To put into the Bill the words now proposed could leave it wide open for employees' organisations to be officially designated by an employer as the representatives of an industry. As my noble friend rightly said, this is the old story that has been argued ever since we joined the trade union movement and ever since that movement became a recognised factor. Therefore, this is a back-door method of getting behind what Parliament intends in regard to so contentious a matter as the Industrial Relations Act, which will eventually be repealed. I do not know whether or not that was the intention, but the effect of adopting this Amendment would be to go a long way behind what is now intended by Parliament; that is, to annul the Industrial Relations Act.

Of course, the same argument applies to Amendment No. 2, and the words, "in prescribed circumstances, by employees". If employees are not sufficiently intelligent to become organised in trade unions, what hope is there of their being effective in meeting the objectives of this Bill? It is essential to get an organised consensus of opinion when applying the principles of health and safety at work as outlined in this Bill. It is essential that workers should be left to organise themselves and to have a sense of responsibility, and they should not act individually. The essence of a good relationship is involved here, and I sincerely hope that the Amendment will not be pressed, because, if it is, the Opposition may be able to carry what it likes. We know that if Amendments Nos. 1 and 2 are pressed it will be a very damaging blow to the new industrial relations which we are attempting to build by repealing the Industrial Relations Act. I sincerely hope that the noble Lord will not press this Amendment.

LORD SHINWELL

NO Member of your Lordships' House can reasonably object to the sentiments expressed by noble Lords opposite who support this Amendment and who seek to safeguard the interests of those who are not in trade unions. One can understand that sentiment. I should have thought that a responsibility for safety, for perhaps a code of conduct relating to safety for those who engage in various occupations up and down the country, was very desirable. The trade unions have to accept this responsibility in the terms set forth in this legislation. Surely that is desirable. One welcomes the sentiments expressed by noble Lords opposite on behalf of employers who are anxious to safeguard the interests of workers. For a long period in our industrial history employers have neglected the safety of workers in their employ. There have been many evidences of neglect. But I do not think we should raise that issue now; better to have a consensus rather than a confrontation on this issue. I can imagine how trade unions, with this responsibility thrust upon them by this legislation, are bound to develop a code of conduct which not only can benefit those who belong to trade unions, but is bound to escalate into the arena of those who do not belong to trade unions.

LORD WYNNE-JONES

Are there not two aspects to this Bill? On the one hand, the Bill is attempting to build up an organisation and a code throughout industry which will improve health and safety. This is a clear obligation which is thrown on employers all the way through the Bill, quite apart from any other machinery which may be set up. The second thing that the Bill is trying to do is to get employers and organised workers together to co-operate in such a way that the maintenance of such stan- dards will be recognised as an obligation throughout industry. If this is what the Bill is trying to do, it is right and proper that it should try to define—I hope a little more carefully than it does at present—the standards that are required. In addition, it must attempt to build up this close co-operation between employers and trade unions, and I should have thought that we would be doing a disservice to the intention of the Bill if we were to do away with this essential obligation.

BARONESS SEEAR

Of course it is correct to say that the arguments against the Amendments have been heard before in this House and elsewhere. But because they have been heard before that does not mean that they have been accepted by those of us who are supporting these Amendments. I should like to comment briefly on some of the points which have been made by noble Lords opposite. In the Amendment being put forward from these Benches, we have not in the least suggested that the subsection which gives the Secretary of State power to require the trade unions to appoint members should be removed. That will remain, and, of course, in all appropriate cases the Secretary of State would use the power laid down in subsection (4). The point we are making is that there should be an additional subsection to cover those cases where subsection (4) is not appropriate. Of course it is the responsibility of the trade unions, as it has always been, to take a lead in matters concerned with health and safety at work.

As has been said, as a result of the Robens Report very much stronger action will be taken in this sphere than has been taken in the past. If our subsection is accepted and the employees have the right to elect then, where trade unions have shown themselves active and vigorous in this matter, it is to be expected that trade union people, such as shop stewards, will be elected to this job. But they, like other people, will have to show that they are giving a good service to their members by the energy that they are putting into the pursuit of safety. If they are doing this, they have no reason to fear that even under our subsection they will not be elected. It gives the employee who is dissatisfied with the way it is being done, or who is inadequately or not at all represented, the opportunity to have rights in the matter of safety which, without this Amendment, would not exist; it is not an antitrade union subsection. How noble Lords opposite can say that this is bringing the Industrial Relations Act back again by the back door, I fail to comprehend. It is so wide of the purpose and content of the Industrial Relations Act, that it can only be an illusion which leads noble Lords to think that this is the intenton. The intention is to safeguard and give rights to those persons who, without this subsection, will not have these rights.

LORD DOUGLASS OF CLEVELAND

I would not have spoken a second time had not the noble Baroness put up so many Aunt Sallys to knock down. We have not put them up. We have argued from this side that if the trade unions have the responsibility of fighting and of setting up this legislation, and ultimately of accepting responsibility for it, then they have the right to be represented at the point of impact where the legislation is being effective—no more, no less, than that. Surely that is simple justice. If the noble Baroness is now spreading the argument to the point where one is dealing with the rights of the individual, then one surely has to carry that to its logical conclusion. When a trade union meets Ministers on matters of social security, environment and health and welfare, then the organisation that she is now talking about should be brought in and should accept its share of the responsibility.

The noble Baroness talked about shop stewards being elected if they fill the bill so far as the members are concerned. What a change from the condemnation of the unofficial strikes of those shop stewards who are elected because they please the members locally, and very often defy agreements which the executive councils of the unions insist on being implemented. If local shop stewards are to be elected only on the basis that they satisfy the individuals whom they represent in the workshops, and ignore the responsibility which their actions entail nationally, then, at the end of the day, she will have a set of shop stewards whom I am quite sure she will condemn much more than those which exist at the present time.

BARONESS ELLES

I should like to draw attention to one sector of the work ing population concerned with health and safety which has not been considered so far, and which would be covered by the Amendment put forward. I think everybody agrees about the importance of safety and health, but there is a certain sector, not only in the United Kingdom but also throughout Western Europe which suffers more accidents than others. I refer particularly to migrant workers who come in unskilled, untrained and unable to speak the language, and therefore unable to read the notices concerning safety in many factories, in fact nearly all factories in the United Kingdom. I would think that it would be desirable that these people, who may indeed be British Commonwealth citizens or United Kingdom passport holders and who would not be represented by trade unions, should have the right of consultation and to elect representatives on these bodies which are very much concerned with their own safety and health. I therefore support the Amendment.

LORD POPPLEWELL

Would the noble Baroness explain who would not be represented by trade unions? Why not? They would have the right to join a trade union.

BARONESS ELLES

Many trade unions are not concerned, unfortunately, with the state of people who are not of the same race.

LORD DOUGLASS OF CLEVELAND

Is the noble Baroness aware that when immigrants enter industry, many unions have put out leaflets in the immigrants' languages; that they have invited them to nominate their own particular shop stewards, and that they have set up classes?—though not to teach them the language, because trade unions cannot afford to do that and it is in any case the job of the education authorities. Is the noble Baroness also aware that the trade unions have discussed particular problems with them because these differ from one country to another? What they are trying to do is to get an understanding between these people and the trade unions and, after that, an understanding with the Government. Simply to say that they must be allowed to be appointed to these safety committees to obtain the desired objectives, in view of what is being achieved at the present time, is really drawing a very long bow. That will not work.

LORD HUGHES

I am rather sorry it is my turn to get up: I have been enjoying this enormously so far! I do not think, in view of what has been said so very effectively by my noble friends on this side of the Chamber, that the Committee will expect me to say that I can accept any of these Amendments. I cannot accept them because they undermine the fundamental thinking behind Clause 2(4), as at present drafted. The Government have reiterated during very extensive discussions in another place—and those reiterations have been repeated by my noble friend Lady Birk and by me in this Chamber—that the basic purpose of this subsection is to confer rights on trade unions to appoint safety representatives—because we want to make it clear to trade unions that we should like them to show more responsibility and play a more active part m promoting health and safety in the workplace. May I say in passing that I cannot understand how the noble Baroness, Lady Elles, has got the idea that trade unions are not there for all workers in industry. I know of no trade union which places a barrier on membership against anyone because of his race or colour, his religion or the lack of it. If the noble Baroness has any evidence to that effect then I am quite certain the Government would be delighted to know all about it.

BARONESS ELLES

Would the noble Lord allow me to say merely that many of the people who come into this country are not members of trade unions—that is the trouble—and therefore are not always represented when matters arise which concern their interests. That is the point I wanted to make.

LORD HUGHES

Yes; I appreciate that people who have just come into the country will not have applied for membership of trade unions before they arrive. That is perhaps just a little too much to expect; but there is no obstacle to their applying as soon as they find employment. I know of no recognised trade union which would place any obstacles in their way. In fact, because of what the noble Baroness has said, perhaps I may say these are the people who are probably much more in need of the protection of trade unions than anyone else, and it is very much in their own interests that they should in fact become members. However, that is not the purpose of the clause and I mention that only in passing.

We have confined this provision to recognised trade unions for two very sound and practical reasons. The first is that the unions are the bodies best organised to take on these responsibilities and it can be positively detrimental to give rights and responsibilities to those who cannot make full use of them. It would not serve a useful purpose to encourage the setting up of safety machinery by people who are not in a position to do any more than go through the motions; but if the trade unions do this job it will not be a motion-seeking formula which will emerge, but a job of work to be carried out effectively. It has been asked: why should these rights be denied to those who are not members of trade unions? There is no question of denying these rights. If people feel that rights are being made available to members of trade unions and they are not members, there is nothing to debar them from acquiring these rights. The implication behind what the noble Baroness, Lady Seear, said was that large sections of people were not in trade unions because someone was preventing their being members of trade unions.

SEVERAL NOBLE LORDS

Order! Order!

LORD HUGHES

I am sorry, but I had reached the point of referring to what the noble Baroness said. If, of course, she is attempting to persuade the withdrawal of all three Amendments, I should be very glad to sit down and facilitate the procedure.

BARONESS SEEAR

I do apologise. I was attempting to persuade the noble Earl, Lord Gowrie—but not along the lines that the noble Lord suggests.

LORD HUGHES

I rather suspected that. If it were the case that there were large numbers of people who for some reason or other were being prevented from obtaining membership of trade unions and therefore getting this safety machinery installed in the way which was most likely to make it work effectively, then I could understand the point of view. The noble Lord, Lord Avebury, referred, I thought in a timely way, to the North Sea oil rigs; but the people working there are not at the moment outside trade unions because they seek to remain out; in some cases, at any rate, they are out because of the unwillingness of employers to give recognition to trade unions and to facilitate membership. I would suggest that in these circumstances if the employees there are unable to get themselves inside a trade union, if this Amendment is put forward they are not going to get any safety organisation which will be worth the paper on which it is written.

For these reasons we think that the best way to make this effective is to put it in the hands of the trade unions, who will make it work. Secondly, all my noble friends on this side of the Chamber have referred to this point in connection with the Industrial Relations Act, but no one has suggested from this side that the Amendments were seeking to bring in another form of the Industrial Relations Act. What they did say, and I think perfectly rightly, was that if we are to legislate so as to require an employer to undertake consultations with his employees otherwise than through the normal channels, we are indeed asking for industrial relations difficulties—and now that we are in the process of getting rid of one lot of industrial relations difficulties it would be the height of folly, by means of Amendments of this kind, to import them in another way.

I appreciate that the Amendment tabled by the noble Earl, Lord Courtown, and the similar Amendment, slightly longer perhaps, put down jointly by the noble Baroness, Lady Seear, and the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, attempt to adopt what they think is a compromise position, by providing a separate regulation-making power to confer rights on employees generally by making no reference to representatives of such employers who would not, of course, be trade union representatives. These Amendments recognise some of the difficulties, and in many ways are perhaps more flexible than the "official" Amendment, if I may so describe it, put down by the noble Earl, Lord Gowrie. I hope he will forgive me for describing it rather loosely in that way. Nevertheless, I am afraid that even these other Amendments do not overcome our fundamental objections. They still have the effect of giving legal rights and responsibilities to safety representatives who will not have an organisation to back them and assist them in exercising such responsibilities.

This, I think, is the real objection to these Amendments. These people who are not represented by unions may have—and I would go further and say will have—a false picture of how their health and safety aspects are being looked after. I recognise the concern of noble Lords regarding the position of non-union employees, but the discrimination which is thought to exist is in fact more apparent than real, because there is nothing to prevent the making of voluntary arrangements between an employer and his employees. Nor is there anything to prevent an employee from joining a trade union, which would be better still. If it should work out that they make voluntary arrangements because they wish to remain outside trade unions and then find that they are not so good as they would like, it may well be that any objection or—and perhaps more likely—any lethargy they have had about joining a trade union may disappear There are few people who are outside trade unions because they have conscientious objections to being members of them. There would not be many people who would be placed in a false position in seeking to get the benefits of this legislation by joining a trade union.

This subsection is about trade union responsibilities, as was the 1970 Employed Persons Health and Safety Bill which was supported by all Parties at the time in which was the precursor of the joint consultation provisions that we have included in this Bill. These provisions represent a long-standing and publicly declared commitment of my Party, and I am afraid we cannot accept that they should be "fudged" by grafting on to them a more general provision which could do nothing but weaken their impact. I hope the Committee do not wish to press any of the Amendments to a Division.

THE EARL OF GOWRIE

Strange as it may seem, one of the speeches I most agreed with was that of the noble Lord, Lord Shinwell. He said it was better in these things to have consensus. It seems to us difficult to achieve consensus when one is dealing with the huge proportion of the workforce that does not belong to officially recognised unions. I should like to say to the noble Lord, Lord Douglass of Cleveland, and to his noble friend Lord Popplewell that we are not here reviving the Industrial Relations Act and the disagreement about registration or recognition. We know that that Act is to be repealed and my right honourable friend the Leader of the Opposition, as your Lordships know, has said that he will not reintroduce it. That being the case, it would be ludicrous of me to try to bring that area of dispute back into the issue. I must assure the Committee I am in no way doing so.

All we are trying to do is protect what we take to be the spirit of Robens in saying that all employees must be involved in consultation in respect of health matters. I cannot see that this should be exclusively the monopoly of organised labour. I welcome increased membership and concern on the part of the unions with safety and health matters. I said that on Second Reading and I have said it again on Committee. However, in the spirit of what the noble Lord, Lord Shinwell, said was the spirit of consensus, and because the whole burden of my speech has been that safety and health questions must cross the union and nonunion divide, I am prepared to withdraw my Amendment. But I must advise the Committee and my noble friends to support the noble Baroness, Lady Seear, in her Amendment (which the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, himself said went some degree to meet the Government) if she chooses to press it to a Division.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

4.3 p.m.

THE EARL OF COURTOWN had given notice of his intention to move Amendment No. 2:

Page 3, line 21, after ("regulations)") insert ("or, as the case may be in prescribed circumstances, by employees").

The noble Earl said: My Amendment does not seek in any way to restrict the power of unions wherever they have representation, but it seems to me unrealistic to ignore the many thousands of establishments in this country where they do not have representation. Amendment No. 3, however, is saying much the same thing, although at rather greater length. I shall not move my Amendment.

BARONESS SEEAR

I beg to move Amendment No. 3 and to divide the Committee.

Amendment moved—

Page 3, line 25, at end insert: (("(4A) Regulations made by the Secretary of State may provide for the election in prescribed cases by employees of safety representatives from amongst the employees, and those representatives shall represent the employees in consultations with the employers under subsection (5) below and may have such other functions as may be prescribed."—(Baroness Seear.)

4.5 p.m.

On Question, Whether the said Amendment (No. 3) shall be agreed to?

Their Lordships divided: Contents, 85; Not-Contents, 53.

CONTENTS
Aberdare, L.	Ebbisham, L.	Kinloss, Ly.
Airedale, L.	Eccles, V.	Loudoun, C.
Allerton, L.	Effingham, E.	Lytton, E.
Amherst, E.	Elles, B.	Mancroft, L.
Amherst of Hackney, L.	Elliot of Harwood, B.	Merrivale, L.
Amulree, L.	Elton, L.	Middleton, L.
Atholl, D.	Emmet of Amberley, B.	Milverton, L.
Auckland, L.	Erskine of Rerrick, L.	Monck, V.
Avebury, L.	Ferrers, E.	Mowbray and Stourton, L.
Balfour of Inchrye, L.	Ferrier, L.	Nugent of Guildford, L.
Barnby, L.	Garner, L.	Nunburnholme, L.
Belhaven and Stenton, L.	Gladwyn, L.	Ogmore, L.
Berkeley, B.	Goschen, V.	O'Neill of the Maine, L.
Brooke of Cumnor, L.	Gowrie, E. [Teller.]	Onslow, E.
Brooke of Ystradfellte, B.	Grenfell, L.	Rankeillour, L.
Camoys, L.	Gridley, L.	Reigate, L.
Carrington, L.	Hacking, L.	Rhyl, L.
Clwyd, L.	Hanworth, V.	Robson, B.
Colville of Culross, V.	Harvey of Prestbury, L.	Rochester, L.
Cork and Orrery, E.	Hawke, L.	Rockley, L.
Courtown, E.	Henley, L.	Sackville, L.
Daventry, V.	Howe, E.	St. Aldwyn, E.
Denham, L.	Hunt, L.	St. Helens, L.
Derwent, L.	Hylton-Foster, B.	Sandys, L.
Drumalbyn, L.	Killearn, L.	Seear, B. [Teller.]
Selkirk, E.	Strange, L.	Wade, L.
Sempill, Ly.	Vernon, L.	Wigoder, L.
Somers, L.	Vivian, L.	Windlesham, L.
Stamp, L.
NOT-CONTENTS
Alport, L.	Elwyn-Jones, L. (L. Chancellor.)	Popplewell, L.
Archibald, L.	Evans of Hungershall, L.	Royle, L.
Ardwick, L.	Faringdon, L.	Sainsbury, L.
Baldwin of Bewdley, E.	Hale, L.	St. Davids, V.
Beswick, L.	Harris of Greenwich, L.	Segal, L.
Birk, B. [Teller.]	Henderson, L.	Shackleton, L.
Boothby, L.	Hughes, L.	Shepherd, L. (L. Privy Seal.)
Brockway, L.	Jacques, L.	Shinwell, L.
Buckinghamshire, E.	Janner, L.	Snow, L.
Burton of Coventry, B.	Lauderdale, E.	Stow Hill, L.
Castle, L.	Leatherland, L.	Strabolgi, L. [Teller.]
Champion, L.	Lee of Asheridge, B.	Summerskill, B.
Chorley, L.	Llewelyn-Davies of Hastoe, B.	Walston, L.
Crook, L.	Lovell-Davies, L.	Wells-Pestell, L.
Davies of Leek, L.	McLeavy, L.	White, B.
Donaldson of Kingsbridge, L.	Pargiter, L.	Wootton of Abinger, B.
Douglas of Barloch, L.	Phillips, B.	Wynne-Jones, L.
Douglass of Cleveland, L.	Platt, L.

On Question, Motion agreed to.

Resolved in the affirmative, and Amendment agreed to accordingly.

LORD HUGHES

In order that the House may hear the Statement on Northern Ireland, I beg to move that the House be now resumed.

House resumed.