HL Deb 25 March 1981 vol 418 cc1200-23

5.27 p.m.

Lord Harris of Greenwich rose to call attention to the closed shop policies of a number of local authorities under which employees who entered their service when there was no requirement that they should be members of a trade union are being required to join a union with the threat of dismissal if they refuse; and to move for Papers.

The noble Lord said: My Lords, I beg leave to move the Motion for Papers which stands in my name on the Order Paper. The issue I want to raise in the House this evening is the closed shop policy of a number of Labour-controlled local authorities. I propose to leave on one side tonight the question of whether or not a closed shop is desirable in itself; whether it is even in the interests of the trade union movement; whether it should be permitted to continue or whether it should be made unlawful. I have no doubt that others will want to discuss these questions, if not tonight, then next Wednesday on the Motion standing in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Renton.

I want to devote my speech tonight to one aspect of the closed shop which I, and I know many others, find entirely objectionable. That is the practice whereby an employer can introduce a retrospective requirement into employees' conditions of service that they should be members of a trade union.

That inevitably brings me to the case of Miss Joanna Harris. Miss Harris is—or was until 11th March of this year—a poultry inspector with the Sandwell district council. She enjoyed her job, and so far as I am aware, everyone agreed that she performed her duties with a high degree of competence. She was not a member of the National and Local Government Officers Association and when she joined the service of the Sandwell council there was no requirement that she should be a member of that—or, for that matter, any other—trade union. However, the majority Labour group on the council decided to introduce a closed shop policy and they determined that it should apply to everyone. Not just new employees—that I think would have been a defensible proposition. Certainly it would have been lawful. But they went a great deal further than that. The new policy, they decided, would cover everyone, including all those who had joined the service of the authority before the date upon which they made their decision to introduce the closed shop policy. Miss Harris and a number of other employees of the council decided that despite this ultimatum they were not prepared to join a trade union. The council then resolved to invoke procedures which have now brought about the dismissal of Miss Harris and will no doubt also cause the sacking of other employees of the council.

But the practice, of course, has not been applied exclusively in Sandwell. We have, we are told, the local authority in Walsall appearing to behave in precisely the same fashion. Here it has been applied to part-time employees of the authority, some earning £9 or £10 a week as part-time dinner ladies in schools. I have no doubt at all that the policy I have described will be extended after the forthcoming local government elections when, as is inevitably the case—or at least, I should say, invariably the case—when a Government are defending a large number of seats they won while in opposition, there will be a significant number of new Labour controlled authorities.

I do not propose, despite the obvious temptation, to discuss in any way this evening the present state of the Labour Party, but all I would say is this. They should, I think, pay some attention in your Lordships' House to the recent statement of the noble Lord, Lord Lever, in which he drew attention to a large number of sensible, moderate Labour councillors being removed by the extremists who now control many constituency Labour parties. I will, if I may, quote from Lord Lever's article on accountability which appeared in the London Review of Books: There is a local back-up to the undermining of Labour Members of Parliament which has received too little attention in the media. A similar process has been even more successfully and ruthlessly applied in the control of municipal offices. Hundreds of experienced councillors of high quality have been ousted in favour of the nominees of this alliance of left-wingers and recently arrived extremists. Even more outrageous demands for control over Council members have been organised and to a large extent accomplished in all the great cities which enjoy large Labour representation—such as London, Manchester, Liverpool and Birmingham. The absence of these local figures further weakens the positions of moderate Members of Parliament as well as dangerously undermining local democracy". That does not come, as is often suggested to be the case, from a source hostile to the Labour Party, but from a senior member of the Cabinets of Sir Harold Wilson and Mr. Callaghan. There can, it seems to me, be no doubt that, in the light of the description given by the noble Lord, Lord Lever, and many others, what we have seen in Sandwell may be repeated in forthcoming months in other local authorities, including some of the largest in the country.

What in these circumstances should be done about it? Before coming to the Government's position on this matter I will, if I may, deal first with two arguments which have been advanced from the official Opposition Benches to defend their colleagues in Sandwell. First, it has been said that there has been altogether too much publicity about these cases. Why, it has been asked, has the press—and by implication those who have raised the issue at all—not been equally concerned by the cases of men who have lost their jobs because of their efforts to introduce trade unionism into non-union companies? I must say I have absolutely no difficulty about answering that question. As someone who has been a member of a trade union since the age of 20, I would deplore the action of any employer who sacked an employee simply because of his trade union activities. So I think that argument can be put on one side.

We come to the second argument which has been put by two noble Lords in this House. It is argued that there must be a great deal to be said for the closed shop; otherwise, it is said, why do so many employers favour it? Well, the answer to that is this, again reminding the House that what we are discussing this evening is not the desirability or the morality of the closed shop in general, but the practice whereby employees' conditions of service are altered retrospectively and against their will: of course many employers have conceded a closed shop, sometimes, it has to be said, after immense pressure from some trade unions. But I find it a little odd hearing the view expressed from the Labour Benches that because an employer favours a particular policy then it is self-evidently right. Nor can it seriously be maintained that the introduction of a closed shop has led to improved industrial relations. Anyone who believes that particular view should examine the position of the national newspaper industry in this country, where the closed shop has existed for many years, and where labour relations have been utterly disastrous, as we all know.

I turn to the Government's position on the matter which I have put down for debate this evening. Certainly the Secretary of State for Employment cannot be accused in any way whatever of having adopted an ambiguous stance on these cases. He invited Miss Harris to meet him in London, and published a letter setting out his views in the most trenchant terms. In his letter of 4th February, which was released to the press, he said: I have already condemned Sandwell council's ruthless and inhuman closed shop policy and I have made it clear that I fully support Miss Harris in her refusal to be bullied into joining a trade union". I share the right honourable gentleman's sentiments entirely—so I believe do the majority of Members of your Lordships' House.

But we cannot, I believe, possibly leave the matter there. It is, of course, true, as the Secretary of State has said in his letter, that Miss Harris can take her case to an industrial tribunal. That is perfectly correct. And indeed she may be given a substantial financial award. Again perfectly correct. But, as Miss Harris has consistently pointed out, it is not compensation she wants; it is her job that concerns her. She likes being a poultry inspector. I must put it to the Minister of State this evening quite bluntly: Why should Parliament not be in a position to insist that she and others like her get their jobs back? I would remind the Minister of State of what his right honourable friend said in his letter of 4th February. Mr. Prior wrote: It is quite clear that what Sandwell are proposing is unlawful under the terms of our recent Employment Act. The staff who have been threatened were already employed by the council before the closed shop was brought into effect. That fact alone is sufficient to make their dismissal unfair". One could not possibly ask for a statement clearer than that. What Sandwell council has done he said, is not only wrong; it is unlawful. Yet, despite this, Miss Harris has lost her job.

As I have said, we cannot leave the matter at that. What action do the Government now propose to take to protect Miss Harris and others who are likely to be placed in a precisely similar position? I should like to ask, first of all—this matter has already been ventilated at Question Time—why the matter has not been referred already to the district auditor. If members of a local authority choose deliberately to flout the law, and a burden is thus unnecessarily imposed on the ratepayers, the councillors concerned can be required by the courts to repay the money involved as individuals. I still hope that we shall hear tonight that the Secretary of State for the Environment will himself direct the attention of the district auditor to the behaviour of the Sandwell and Walsall councils and, indeed, any other council that is involved in this highly disagreeable process. I believe that a reminder about the fate of the Clay Cross councillors might have a most valuable effect on some of even the most militant members of local authorities.

But even this procedure does, of course, take time. What we require here is, I believe, urgent action. As it is clear, on the basis of what has been said by the Secretary of State for Employment, that the behaviour of the Sandwell local authority is unlawful, is the Secretary of State prepared to consult the law officers of the Crown with a view to applying for injunctions to restrain the local authorities concerned from dismissing their employees, in deliberate defiance of the law of this country?

I think that I must say the following most emphatically to the Minister this evening. It will not be enough for him tonight to rely exclusively on the industrial tribunal argument in terms of compensation. That, as we all know perfectly well, may secure for those concerned financial compensation; but it will not get them their jobs back. And that is what they want. They do not want to find themselves given a cheque, a friendly pat on the back, and then dismissed to join the growing army of the unemployed. Indeed, I believe that it would be intolerable were that to be the outcome of these cases.

Miss Harris and her colleagues have—and I repeat again that we have been told this by the Secretary of State—been sacked unlawfully. Why then should they not receive the full protection of the law for the stand that they have taken? It is a matter of total irrelevance whether or not we, as individual Members of this House, think that people have in any particular case—in this case or, indeed, for that matter in any other case—behaved well or badly, or whether it is desirable or not that they should be a member of a trade union. There is only one issue of importance: Should we allow this grievous wrong to be done to these women, in this particular case, or to any others in other cases—that they should be sacked at a time of rising unemployment—when the law of Britain clearly states that employers are not to behave in this abominable manner?

When sitting some two years or so ago on the Government Front Bench in this House, I had the good fortune to listen to a number of speeches from the noble and learned Lord the present Lord Chancellor, then of course speaking for the Opposition. In a number of those speeches the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hailsham of Saint Marylebone, drew attention to the fact that a number of Members of another place, and some local authorities, appeared to be contemptuous of the rule of law. They did not, he said, appear to like the courts; they seemed to harbour the deepest suspicions of the judiciary, and were increasingly inclined to support unconstitutional action in order to achieve their objectives. I agreed with his view when he expressed it. I still do so. Indeed, I believe that the threat to our society from these elements is a great deal more profound now than when he spoke from this side of the House.

That being so, I hope that the noble and learned Lord, occupying as he now does that great office of state of Lord Chancellor, will take the keenest personal interest over these cases. What is being done in Sandwell and Walsall represents an outrageous and, as we know from the Secretary of State, an unlawful assault on the civil liberties of a number of our fellow citizens. In my view it calls for immediate action from the Government to safeguard their position and to forestall an arbitrary and tyrannical abuse of power. I hope that we shall be assured by the Minister of State tonight that the Government are prepared to take such action. My Lords, I beg to move for Papers.

5.45 p.m.

Lord Rochester

My Lords, I am sure that the whole House will be grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, for having introduced this Motion, but on behalf of my noble friends I should like to do more than just thank him for having done so. I believe that this is the first debate initiated in the House of Lords by someone who has declared himself a supporter of the Council for Social Democracy, which tomorrow is to become a new political party. I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Harris, on having made a speech that was truly liberal—with a small "1"—in its advocacy of individual freedom. It augurs well for that close co-operation in Parliament which I fervently hope will lead eventually to the formulation of agreed policies and put a stop at last to the constant changes in economic direction which, for the past 30 years, have done so much damage to British industry.

The Earl of Gowrie

My Lords, I hesitate to intervene, but I cannot let that last comment pass. The closeness of the present Government's economic policies to those of the previous Government has hardly been denied.

Lord Rochester

My Lords. I am glad that the noble Lord, Lord Harris, said at the start that he would leave on one side some of the wider issues affecting closed shops and I shall do my best to follow him, for we shall have an opportunity in the debate next week on trade union immunities generally, to discuss those other matters.

The noble Lord devoted his speech to what he called the indefensible practice whereby an employer can introduce into the conditions of service of his employees a retrospective requirement that they should be trade union members. I agree with him very strongly on that point. It is the same tyrannical practice which resulted in the dismissal in 1976 of people who had for years given faithful service to British Rail. Their case is now before the European Court and I shall not comment on it further, except to reaffirm the abhorrence that Liberals feel for the detestable thinking that underlies the imposition of closed shops in such a pitiless manner.

When three weeks ago the noble Lord, Lord Harris, asked a Question about the closed shop policies of Sandwell and Walsall District Councils I said that those like me who have advised against the immediate abolition of closed shops on practical grounds, found that our position had been made more difficult to maintain. The noble Earl, Lord Gowrie, in reply very properly emphasised the need for laws to be enacted that had the overall consent of the public. I acknowledge that point. Indeed, I did so when the Employment Bill was debated in your Lordships' House last year and I do not depart now from the view which I then expressed.

In the case of Miss Joanna Harris I must also accept that, under the present law, now that she has lost her job she has no claim to reinstatement, but only to compensation for unfair dismissal. The question remains as to what the Government and the rest of us can do which will affect the immediate position. Like the noble Lord, Lord Harris, I shall await with interest what the Minister has to say in reply to Lord Harris's question as to whether the Secretary of State for the Environment will himself direct the attention of the district auditor to the behaviour of Sandwell Council. If the Minister does not feel able to take that course then I express the hope that, if Miss Harris puts her case before an industrial tribunal and obtains compensation for unfair dismissal, some Sandwell elector will then take action. That is because it is clear that the Sandwell Council has infringed the statutory rights of its employees under the Employment Act 1980, and it is therefore open to anyone to raise the matter with the district auditor, who may decide to investigate, with the result that individual councillors could be held responsible for expenditure that would otherwise fall on the ratepayers. I would further ask the noble Earl, Lord Gowrie, whether, if the district auditor finds that some loss has been incurred through the wilful misconduct of councillors, the auditor may himself initiate action to recover the sum involved.

While I am at it, there are a few other questions to be asked about Sandwell Council. What is known about the circumstances under which any ballot of union members was held to approve the closed shop agreement?—which I understand was introduced last July, only a few weeks before the Employment Act became law. Were all the council's employees given an opportunity to vote? Are there any others, besides Miss Harris, who were not members of NALGO when the agreement was made, who have not since joined the union and who may, therefore, also be under threat of dismissal? If so, how many of them are there? I am sure that it is fitting for questions like these to be raised in Parliament so that the facts can be made known to as many people as possible.

I have said nothing about Walsall Council, for there is quite enough to be going on with at Sandwell, but I would hope that when the noble Earl replies he will tell us as much as he can about the position there and, indeed, in any other places where council employees are threatened with dismissal or, for that matter, with action short of dismissal.

There is one last specific question which I should like to ask the Minister. This is rather a different point. Is it true that certain local authorities, in particular Darlington Borough Council, are persisting in bringing pressure to bear on outside contractors to introduce closed shops by excluding from approved lists of tenderers contractors who do not operate a closed shop? If the allegation is true, what remedies are available to contractors subjected to that sort of pressure?

Having said all that, in the light of my industrial experience I still hope that it will not be necessary to introduce any further legislation relating to closed shops, for I very much doubt whether that would do anything positive to solve the problems of human relations in industry or in local government. But if there are not to be such further laws, I cannot stress too strongly that it is essential for employers and for trade unions to observe those laws that were enacted last year. Even as matters now stand, I suggest that there are certain positive steps that ordinary people can take which should affect the behaviour of those who are parties to closed shop agreements of the kind recently introduced at Sandwell; that is, trade union representatives and local councillors.

First, I take trade unions. I hope that the members concerned will move in concert to elect leaders who will act in accordance with the view that the great majority of trade unionists continue to express in opinion polls whenever questions involving closed shops are raised. It is my experience that in trade unions as much as in other organisations bullying is best stamped out by the general body of members combining together for that purpose.

In the case of local councils, electors likewise have a remedy. The noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, referred to the large number of sensible, moderate Labour councillors now being removed by extremists who control many constituency Labour parties. I console myself with the thought that the more extreme the view of local Labour councillors, surely the more likely it is that the general body of electors will turn against them.

Understandably, members of the Social Democratic Party which is to be formed tomorrow may not be in a position to stand at the county council elections to be held in May. But I trust that it will not be thought mere electioneering on my part to point out that there will then be plenty of Liberal candidates in the field. It is for the voters to draw their conclusions. However, I very much hope that one result of the forthcoming elections will be that in places such as Sandwell, Wallsall, or any other places where the cap fits, district councillors will find themselves under increasing pressure to change their behaviour.

Finally, I should like simply to reaffirm that my noble friends and I are greatly indebted to the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, for calling the attention of the House to the issue of civil liberties that has been raised in this debate.

5.56 p.m.

Lord Brookes

My Lords, I, too, am most grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, for having ventilated this noxious issue in your Lordships' House. West Bromwich, being part of Sandwell, the place of my birth and the place with which—with some permissible pride, I associate the formality of my title, it is a matter of great sorrow and shame to me that this should be a place prominent among local authorities which use public office and public money to trample upon human freedoms and deny the right to work other than conditionally.

I cannot be present in the House next week and it is difficult to discuss this subject without reference to the trade unions because, in truth, certainly in West Bromwich, if not indeed elsewhere, they have much on their conscience tonight. But because it would be unfair for me to be accused of union bashing or because it would be wrong for me to be felt unmindful of the great lives which have been dedicated to a great movement, let it be said for and on the record that in a lifetime in industry, including 10 years as chairman of Britain's largest engineering company, which then had approximately 80,000 people employed in the United Kingdom, I never knowingly conceded or tolerated a closed shop. I never found it necessary to do so and I enjoyed, and continue to enjoy, excellent relationships, friendships, trust and confidences with the leaders of the trade union movement at all levels.

However, I always knew the closed shop to be evil; I felt it to be part of my responsibility to deny it; I felt it to be my duty to my employees to accord to them the same equity, the same freedom, the same respect and the same respites as my shareholders and to rank in all respects equal with my shareholders, and I succeeded. Therefore, deplore the relatively modem trend in management whereby—on the fragile excuse that closed shops convenience industrial relations—employers press their employees beyond the bounds of freedom, and even make it a condition that unless you belong to a union, you may not have a job. So, in this matter, management does not have clean hands, and in my view does not have sensible hands.

The great tragedy, economic and social, of our time —the greatest in my lifetime—is that this great movement, the trade union movement, born necessarily and desirably of all the inequities and horrors of the Industrial Revolution, should have been misused; and that the ideals and the service of great men who have led it should have been misused by minorities to the point where it has become the greatest tyranny of our age; licensing and charging people to work; licensing employers to employ; and increasingly having the temerity to seek to license elected Governments to govern. I have too much written for the time available, so I shall pass on. I refer to a strange inconsistency again of our time; the kind of schizophrenia whereby we rightly condemn apartheid in South Africa and legislate for industrial apartheid in our own country, and they are both equally evil and tragic.

I come now to the indelicacies, the indecencies, or that which, if I were in another place, seeking your Lordships' pardon, I might even refer to as the stench of Sandwell, and in particular to the tragedy of the torture of Joanna Harris. I am well aware that by abstruse legal arguments a brilliant Front Bench can defend, or seek to defend, in good conscience or not, that which is indefensible. I am quite content to go down to defeat before the brilliance of debate, because that will never override truth or freedom. But some points are worth making about that which actually happened at Sandwell. I am briefed by people in the town, and if I make errors I apologise. I rely on information given to me.

It is abundantly and overwhelmingly clear that there was conspiracy, brilliant and rapid conspiracy, between a left-wing town hall and left-wing local executive committees of the unions concerned. In rapid succession, and in order to seek to circumvent the impending 1980 law and code of practice, they rushed through in three separate blocks three sets of closed shop agreements. These things are called UMAs, and that managed to make them sound a little more respectable. in the third of these came the NALGO union, but, prior to Block 3 of these hurried agreements, NALGO conducted a poll on the closed shop issue of its union members, not of all the people in the grades to which NALGO would normally relate itself.

The issue was, should there, or should there not, be a closed shop? The proposal was defeated. But, not to be deflected, and at great speed, the left-wing executive committee of the NALGO union organised another poll, again of NALGO members only, not all of whom received their paper in time to vote. On this second poll, 810 voted in favour, 671 against, out of what would have been an electorate of 3,600 of the appropriate grades under the law as it now stands, inadequate though I believe that present law to be. The votes were counted by the president, the chairman, and the vice-chairman of the executive committee of NALGO. They were counted properly or improperly, and I have to say that because there was no audit of the count and there was no audit of the processess leading to the poll.

Such, then, is the sorry state, such then is the value, such is the worth of democracy in Sandwell, and such is the demonstrated worth of democracy in the trades union movement. I greatly dislike saying that because, I repeat, there are a great many in this House who have given their lives to that movement and they deserve a better reward, a more dignified status, and a more dignified contribution to our society than we are now getting from that to which they have given their lives.

As for poor Joanna Harris following these events, she went to inquisitions which have been described to me as being Star Chamber-like in nature. Thereafter, accompanied by a courageous local councillor, Mrs. Jones, hopefully or hopelessly—who shall know?—she went to see the right honourable gentleman the Secretary of State for Employment. He, I am told, to receive this little girl was surrounded by a panoply of advisers. She must have been getting a little tired of officialdom. I know that she had great courtesy, but all that she had at the end was a procedural washing of hands and a useless reference to an industrial tribunal. I am ashamed to believe that any member of the party which I have served all my life should think that money will substitute for freedom or the right to work. This Government stand condemned, in my view, by the inadequacies of their own legislation because that legislation left the loopholes which have brought about the suffering of Joanna Harris and others.

Picking up one or two points that have been made, I believe that this council has already been legally advised that the district auditor will have no claims against them. I do not question the original or present integrity of intent of the Secretary of State for Employment. I would never question that. I believe him to be a well-motivated, good man who has sought to attract the right response from responsible trades unionists, but that his aspirations have been destroyed by extremists. Thus, this Government have broken faith with their own manifesto; broken faith with the electorate; and allowed evil to occur for which there is in this House tonight no apparent remedy. In short, like Governments before them, they have not learned that no spoon is long enough to enable you safely to sup with the devil. I leave with a thought for the Minister of State: there is still time to remedy these injustices, to lift up the hearts of the people who elected them, by introducing—and I do not like it—reinforcing retrospective legislation to redress these evils. If they do not, then all I can say is God save freedom, God save England and God save us from the expediencies of politics!

6.10 p.m.

Lord Harris of High Cross

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, for taking up the case of our namesake from Sandwell, and I fully share the sense of outrage he expressed about the treatment of that courageous young lady. I was suitably impressed by the delicate courtship by the noble Lord, Lord Rochester, of the noble Lord, Lord Harris, as a social democrat. I was enormously impressed by the noble Lord, Lord Brookes, who I find it difficult to follow with credit, for Lord Brookes as a practised, enormously experienced industrialist, has given the lie to so much of what we heard in the debates on the Employment Act about the necessity for the closed shop, and he set an example of liberalism to those on the Liberal Benches who so often uphold individual freedom in principle and acquiesce time and again in its erosion in particular cases.

The noble Lord, Lord Brookes, told us how the closed shop came to be fastened on the workpeople in Sandwell and how, after two polls a few months apart, the closed shop was approved by fewer than one in four of the employees who would be affected, a large number having been disfranchised by not being allowed to vote on that issue. He omitted to deploy the point that the date chosen to enforce the closed shop by Sandwell Council was 1st August, chosen deliberately as two weeks ahead of the coming into effect of the Employment Act, which would have required an 80 per cent. affirmative vote of all the employees in order to create a new closed shop.

Since November, apart from Miss Joanna Harris, we have had evidence of the persecution of people like deputy matrons of old people's homes and ordained Baptist ministers of religion, and the majority have backed down. They backed down under the threat literally of a firing squad; they would be sacked if they did not back down. Miss Joanna Harris has not backed down, having explained: All I know is that I believe in freedom of choice and Sandwell Council is trying to take this away from me. I will not be pushed around". Most plaintively, she said: I still cannot believe that this is happening under English law". The branch secretary of NALGO, a Mr. Eric Faux, as though replying to Miss Joanna Harris's plea, is quoted as saying: It may appear to be unfair, undemocratic and un-British, but it is not illegal". That is the issue I put to the Minister today. I believe that in that last assertion by the branch secretary of NALGO, Mr. Eric Faux was correct, and therefore I believe the Secretary of State was wrong in the letter which the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, quoted on 4th February, which was issued to the press and is therefore available to be checked, in which the Secretary of State used these words: It is quite clear that what Sandwell are proposing is unlawful under the terms of our recent Employment Act". It is not a legal quibble but critically important that we should be clear once and for all if that statement is true. I claim that what Sandwell has done is not unlawful, however much it may be insensitive, highhanded, authoritarian or even shameful. This issue has been raised in two Starred Questions tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, and each time there has been reference to the statutory rights of employees having clearly been infringed, but no clear statement about whether it is unlawful under the 1980 Act. I wrote to the noble Earl, Lord Gowrie, following the last Starred Question and asked this specific question: Was it unlawful? In his courteous answer, for which I thank him, he told me, again elaborately, about the statutory rights that had been infringed but he did not come specifically to the question whether what they had done was unlawful.

If Sandwell Council have broken the law, then noble Lords in all parts of the House might agree that they should be prosecuted. The important fact is that if Sandwell Council have not broken the law, then we can prevent a repetition of these sad events only by changing what has proved in practice to be an unsatisfactory or ineffective statute. As I am advised, the 1980 Act does not prevent any employer from acting exactly as Sandwell have acted. Section 7, which I remember well debating through its various stages in this House, specifically licenses an employer to dismiss an employee in precisely these circumstances; where there is a union membership agreement—that is, a closed shop, as there are covering perhaps 7 million employees at the present time—the employer can sack anyone who refuses to join.

The only question is whether hush money will be paid to the victims and, if so, how much. The lawful sacking of Joanna Harris may subsequently be judged to be fair or unfair—it was clearly unfair because the 1980 Act provided that it was an unfair practice to sack someone who was already working in a shop to which a union membership agreement applied—and if it is judged unfair, compensation must be paid. But there is no right for the victim to be reinstated. The victim may appeal to the employment appeal tribunal, which may order reinstatement, but the employer can refuse to reinstate, in which case the victim will simply get more hush money as compensation for loss of the job.

It was because the employer was so often egged on by the trade union to refuse reinstatement or to sack a non-member of the union that the 1980 Act made one advance; namely, it provided employers with the right to join the union in the proceedings before an industrial tribunal. Then, if the tribunal finds that the dismissal of the employee was unfair, the tribunal can order the trade union to pay the employer up to the full amount of any compensation that may be awarded. Those possibilities lie in the future. It might be noted that Sandwell Council have announced a clear understanding with NALGO that the union will not be joined in any action of that kind, and that seems to be the only point where the district auditor could get a look in, because the council and the union conspire to say that the ratepayer shall be charged with any compensation.

But of course Miss Joanna Harris has not yet decided whether to appeal; she just wants her job back, and on that she has three months to decide whether to go to the industrial tribunal. The consideration in her mind is that if she goes to the industrial tribunal, which can be six months or a year away, that would leave her with further costs, and there is no provision for legal aid before the industrial tribunal.

We are often told, particularly from the Labour Benches, that you cannot make trade unionists work with non-members. Their case is that to outlaw the closed shop would not be effective because trade unionists will not work with non-members. But if the law quite explicitly prohibited the closed shop, as it does throughout Europe, then the effect of what is happening in Sandwell and elsewhere would be plainly to expose trade union funds to action for massive damages. That would provide a test as to whether ordinary trade union members think it is really worth paying large sums of money in order to indulge the preference for closed shops.

On this issue and many others that we are to see over the coming months it is no good trying to blame noble Lords on the Labour Benches for their advocacy of the closed shop. By a melancholy accident of history the Labour Party has to appear all the time as the partisans and protagonists of trade unions, though even they must be becoming increasingly uneasy about some of the examples of misuse of trade union power. We have to blame the Conservative Benches, because the Conservative Party came into power in 1979 with an overwhelming authority from the electorate to strike a decisive blow against what was seen to be trade union tyranny of just the kind that we have witnessed periodically ever since, and which the 1980 Act cannot stop. Well, Tories of a more philosophical bent often like—or used to like—to quote Burke. I would tonight remind them of his verdict on Hampden's refusal to pay ship money. Burke said: Would 20 shillings have ruined Mr. Hampden's fortune? No. But the payment of half of 20 shillings on the principle it was demanded would have made him a slave". It was because Miss Joanna Harris would not be a slave that she has now been sacked. And that is the grim choice that confronts in total probably 7 million people in legal or informal closed shops, who are imprisoned, many of them involuntarily, in union membership. I believe that they are entitled to look to Parliament for early relief.

6.23 p.m.

Lord Bruce of Donington

My Lords, the House will be grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, for providing the opportunity to ventilate this most important matter. As we expected, the noble Lord has given the House the benefit of his further studies into this affair that he raised in Question form in your Lordships' House on 13th February, as reported at column 405. The burden of the argument of the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, as I understood it, was that he was not going to discuss the merits or demerits of the closed shop as such. His prime point was that the actions of the Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council were unlawful. The noble Lord made that point in the course of his supplementary questions after the reply given to him on 13th February by the noble Lord, Lord Lyell. Indeed, he purported to quote—I do not use the term "purported" in an at all abusive sense—from a letter written by the Secretary of State to Mr. McWhirter on 4th February, in which the Minister is quoted as saying, as reported at column 407 of the Official Report: It is quite clear that what Sandwell are proposing is unlawful under the terms of our recent Employment Act". It is true enough that the noble Lord, Lord Lyell, in the course of a reply to a later supplementary question, pointed out that it was possibly unwise not to go on to quote further passages from the letter. At least that is what the noble Lord implied. He said, as reported at column 407: I am always tempted when noble Lords quote from letters to say to them, 'Read on, read on', because very often such statements are taken out of context". I am not accusing the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, of quoting out of context. Having listened to the noble Lord, I am quite convinced that he is firmly of the opinion that the actions taken by this particular council are unlawful, and it is on the record that the Government think so, too, if the quotation from a letter read out by the noble Lord, Lord Harris, is accurate, as I have no doubt it is—

Lord Harris of Greenwich

My Lords, I do not wish to interrupt the noble Lord since I have certainly drawn upon the letter today, but on 13th February it was in fact quoted by the noble Lord, Lord Harris of High Cross.

Lord Bruce of Donington

I beg the noble Lord's pardon; but at any rate the letter was quoted. The burden of the noble Lord's complaint today—which he has accompanied by adjectives such as "inhuman", "abominable", "outrageous"—stems from his fundamental accusation of illegality. It is the duty of all parties, in government or in opposition, to see that the laws as they are passed are upheld. An accusation of illegality should not be lightly made. So I was particularly grateful when the noble Lord, Lord Harris of High Peak, rose to his feet and proceeded to demonstrate—

A noble Lord

Lord Harris of High Cross.

Lord Bruce of Donington

I am sorry, my Lords; I mean the noble Lord, Lord Harris of High Cross. There are so many Harrises in this case that perhaps I may be forgiven for the slight confusion. The noble Lord, Lord Harris of High Cross, rose to his feet and demonstrated, in my view quite conclusively, that of course the council had not at all acted illegally. In amplification of that point, may I cite to your Lordships the section of the Employment Protection (Consolidation) Act 1978 that deals with this aspect of the matter. Section 58(3) states: Dismissal of an employee by an employer shall be regarded as fair for the purposes of this part"— that is this part of the Act— if—

  1. (a) it is the practice, in accordance with a union membership agreement, for employees for the time being of the same class as the dismissed employee to belong to a specified independent trade union, or to one of a number of specified independent trade unions; and
  2. (b) the reason for the dismissal was that the employee was not a member of the specified union or one of the specified unions, or had refused or proposed to refuse to become or remain a member of that union or one of those unions;".
If the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, will forgive me, I should like to mention in parenthesis that that Act was passed by a Government of which he was a member, and of which Mrs. Shirley Williams was a leading member. I cannot recall this question having been raised by the noble Lord or by Mrs. Shirley Williams in such passionate terms as have been addressed to the House today. As no doubt the noble Earl, Lord Gowrie, will mention, it is quite true that that part of the 1978 Act has been modified by Section 7 of the Employment Act 1980. As the noble Lord, Lord Harris of High Cross, reminded us, Section 7 came into operation by means of a Statutory Instrument issued by the Department of Employment on 15th August. Thus, the agreement itself was not unlawful.

As to whether the Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council have acted unfairly, this is another question altogether. It may well be that, if the procedures that are envisaged by the main Act are followed, the tribunal to which an appeal can be made under the Employment Protection (Consolidation) Act 1978 will decide in favour of the appellant, whoever he or she may be. There does not seem to be any reason why this appeal should not be made in accordance with the provisions of the Act. Many questions of dire hardship have been raised, and, as I say, strong adjectives have been used to describe the plight of Miss Joanna Harris. But if the injury is all that grievous, and even if in fact it merits only a part of the descriptions which fell from the lips of the noble Lord, Lord Brookes, then surely she will be easily able to mitigate at any rate the hardship part by going through the normal appeals procedures, which are still open to her and which will in fact be open to her until 11th June.

Therefore, if Miss Harris thinks that she has been maltreated or unfairly dismissed, then the remedies are open to her. I do not share the views of the noble Lord, Lord Brookes, that the remedies in the Act itself are of no consequence. I do not think the noble Earl opposite would permit them to remain in existence if they were of no effect. The noble Earl shares with those of us on this side of the House the view that where an unfairness has been done to an individual then that unfairness should be rectified, more particularly if there is statutory provision for it; and I would hope that this would be done.

In so far as the agreement is concerned, I am bound to say this. There has been no particular haste by the union in this matter to get a closed shop agreement. It was mooted at one time, in 1977, and the branch considered it, but there was a ballot against it. It was raised again within the union itself in 1979, but then, once again, the union held a ballot and rejected it. It was in mid-1980 that the question was raised once again, and an offer was made to the union and to the other unions concerned by the Sandwell Borough Council. That offer they accepted, and the agreement was signed between the local authority and the union on 25th July 1980, to become effective on 1st August 1980.

Moreover, the form of the agreement itself, the general text of which I have in front of me, is in complete conformity with the Department of Employment's code of practice on this particular matter. It follows quite meticulously, so far as I can see, the guidelines that were laid down, either before the Minister came into office or afterwards, for the conduct of this type of operation. So there does not seem to be any reason why the agreement and the provisions under the agreement, which provide for appeals on specific grounds, should not have been followed out.

Miss Harris was first interviewed on this matter on 21st January 1981, which was some six weeks after the issue first arose—it could have been hastened—and she was seen again on 11th February. I am not in a position to deny what the noble Lord said about inquisitorial methods. Personally speaking, I would doubt it; and I would require the production of some evidence to know that that was in fact the case. When one is being questioned one tends to regard all questioning or interviews as inquisitorial, but I think that accounts conveyed second-hand on a hearsay basis should be treated with some reserve.

As to Miss Joanna Harris herself—who, as the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, pointed out, was a Sandwell Council poultry meat inspector—it would seem from the press reports that have appeared (and I would emphasise that these have not been provided to me by the parties concerned) that one of the chicken slaughter-houses where Miss Harris inspected poultry on behalf of the Sandwell Council was a family firm owned by her grandfather, in addition to her mother and uncle being directors of the firm. Also, before it became mandatory for local authorities to inspect white as well as red meat in accordance with the EEC meat hygiene regulations, it is understood that Miss Harris worked at her grandfather's firm as a direct employee.

I cannot vouch for the information—it is hearsay; it has only been in the press, and I do not assert it as a fact—but since there has been so much other hearsay bandied about it is perhaps necessary to say that it has also been released in the press that her grandfather had previously set up a trust fund for Joanna Harris, into which he makes a payment of approximately £600 with an increase of £200 a year to the firm which trades under the name of Ward's Poultry Limited.

Lord Harris of Greenwich

My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord one question? What on earth has this got to do with what we are discussing?

Lord Bruce of Donington

Yes, my Lords. The case has been made out, in very extravagant terms, of a very considerable amount of personal hardship to an individual. When considering whether or not a person has suffered material hardship, it is only right that one should take their circumstances, so far as they are known, into account. I pass no comment on them. They have merely, as I say, been released to the press, like so many other statements that have been made here this afternoon. Since the debate has been limited—

Lord Brookes

My Lords, will the noble Lord give way? Clearly I could not have been present—neither, for that matter, could the noble Lord opposite—at any examination or inquisition relating to Miss Joanna Harris; but I did not quote from newspapers, I did not quote from speculation and I did not quote from the spoken word. I quoted from information communicated to me by a highly respected member of the local authority concerned—and I named her.

Lord Bruce of Donington

My Lords, I immediately accept that from the noble Lord, and I would not wish to impute anything to the contrary. However, one must always say—and I think most noble Lords would agree—that what is hearsay must be treated as hearsay, from whatever source it comes.

The noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, deliberately did not raise the question of the desirability or otherwise of closed shops. However, while not seeking to detain the House on this matter, I am bound to say that it is always very easy for people who, owing to the activities of trade unions, achieve wages levels and conditions-of-work levels which have been the result of combined trade union effort to say, "We want no part of this"—but, at the same time, they continue to emjoy the benefits of the combined organisation for which they seem to have a somewhat fastidious distaste, knowing perfectly well that, regardless, they will continue to be employed and remunerated, in most cases, at levels determined by the trade union movement in negotiation with the employers.

Lord Robbins

My Lords, is the noble Lord asking the House to believe that the increase in the standard of life and of protection, which has been from time to time the consequence of the formation of trade unions, involves behaviour of the kind that we have heard described this evening?

Lord Bruce of Donington

No, my Lords, I am not inviting the House to reach any such conclusion. The remarks that I have made I trust are temperate and have avoided the use of some of the extravagant language that we have heard here this evening and which I, suggest to your Lordships is wholly inappropriate to the degree of personal injury or damage sustained.

A noble Lord

No!

Lord Bruce of Donington

And, my Lords, particularly in the light of the fact that the procedures which are laid down in the Act have not been followed. I recollect a case in which the noble Lord, Lord Belstead, was replying to me on a question of an alleged injury inflicted on someone at a party conference He did not argue to me about it at all. He merely said that no complaint had been received; and he regarded that as conclusive. In this case we are faced with the fact that there are procedures provided under the Act of which no advantage has been taken. The time has still not run out; it is still there until 15th May or, alternatively, 15th June. One hopes it will be invoked.

I trust that the House may bear in mind the observations which only yesterday fell from the lips of the right honourable gentleman Mr. Prior, the Secretary of State for Employment, when speaking at a meeting of the Institute of Directors. A report of the meeting reads: Mr. Prior, the opening speaker to the Institute's 2,000 delegates at the Albert Hall, gave examples of employers who, he said, were more determined than any trade union to maintain certain closed-shop arrangements". It is precisely because both sides of industry see advantages in the closed shop that the closed shop and the introduction of the closed shop continues. There is no case for their abolition and the Government themselves, I feel, would not make a case for their abolition.

One would never condone—and we on this side of the House would never condone—unfair acts or unfair conduct under any Act. Our function at this time, and the most useful one we can perform, is to urge upon the Government to begin to create a social climate within which good industrial relations can be established; because ultimately the whole of the industrial relations field depends on complete cooperation between the management and the unions in order to ensure that both sides get a fair deal and to ensure that hardship is inflicted on no one. This is the way I feel that the Government, any Government, ought to proceed rather than by trying to legislate on matters which the Government themselves admit are not always susceptible to legislation.

6.46 p.m.

The Earl of Gowrie

My Lords, this debate, which I welcome very much, has to some degree been about law and the interpretation of law. But principally it has been about people, people who, in the words of my noble friend Lord Brookes, use public office and public money to trample on human freedoms. The cases of this kind which the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, referred to in his brilliant opening speech are intolerable. Sandwell is the most notorious example, but there are others and very worryingly, as Lord Harris pointed out, there may be more in the pipeline.

May I go over what is agreed about the case of Sandwell? Last year a local authority, the Sandwell Borough Council, introduced closed shops: at first covering all the manual employees and then, last July, before the Act came into force, white collar staff. That included Miss Joanna Harris, who has been mentioned many times in this debate. Councillor John Edwards, the chairman of the council's works committee, claimed that his council had a mandate from the electorate to force union membership on all employees regardless of their wishes. The union in question is NALGO. So if in Sandwell Borough Council NALGO discovers that someone is employed by the Council but is not a paid-up member it has only to get in touch with an officer of the council, a Mr. Hodgetts, who is Sandwell's personnel director and who has instructions to investigate the individual concerned. This means in effect that the local NALGO official, a Mr. Faux, faces the council employees with the choice of joining the union or being sacked. Mr. Faux has himself said—and the noble Lord, Lord Harris of High Cross instanced this—that he has no conscience about doing so. By this process of employees having to join up or get out, those who object are weeded out or, in the case of Miss Joanna Harris, sacked for sticking to their guns.

In referring to Miss Harris, I must say to the noble Lord, Lord Bruce of Donington, that it really is not relevant what her personal circumstances are. Were she the principal legatee of the late Paul Getty she should have redress to the law in the Sandwell case. On the other point that the noble Lord raised—that it is easy for people to take benefits from unions without contributing to their terms and conditions—well, as we know, one of the very dubious benefits of increasing upward movements in wage pressures due to union monopoly and activity has been increased unemployment. That is not a benefit that should continue.

My Lords, as you know, the Government oppose the principle of closed shops, and we share the public concern over the way these local authorities have acted. It is quite right that this House should voice the widely held criticisms of the actions. Councillors, and those they purport to represent, should be aware of the concern that these intolerable policies can cause.

I really think that, by any normal ethical standards, Councillor Edwards, Mr. Hodgett, Mr. Faux and their associates in the Sandwell case are thoroughly bad men, and their actions thoroughly wicked. I hope that the electors of Sandwell are alert to the kinds of action which are being taken in their name.

Let me now look at the general background to this debate. Last year, a few local authorities pushed through union membership agreements shortly before the Employment Act took effect in August. The Act of course requires that new agreements should be approved by a secret ballot of employees if the agreement is to give the employer a defence in tribunal cases. But these councils did not want to put the agreements to the vote of the employees whom they were going to affect. And then—over a period of months—one or two councils have begun to put pressure on employees to become union members or face dismissal. In the case of Miss Harris, the council have actually dismissed her, as we know.

I do not think that on any general principles there is any case at all for closed shops within local authorities, whatever one may feel about closed shops elsewhere. Even the noble Lord, Lord McCarthy, whose expertise on industrial relations we all acknowledge and whose book defends closed shops on the grounds that these are sometimes necessary for efficient collective bargaining, could find no need for them among local authority staff. Unions have for a long time been able to achieve high levels of membership within local authorities and to negotiate effectively without closed shops.

Indeed, one of the unusual features in the cases that we are discussing tonight is that it has been the employer —not the union—which has set the pace. Often in closed shops employers say that union pressure requires them to agree to a closed shop. But here there is no evidence of union pressure. Rather it is the ideology of the councillors which has been the motivating force. I am not saying that the unions are free from blame. I have mentioned the uncompromising attitude of the local NALGO official Mr. Eric Faux and the union's vigorous pursuit of dissenters, which shows their own contempt for the TUC's guidance on closed shops —a document which urges flexibility and tolerance. Not much flexibility and no tolerance at all has been shown to Miss Harris, my Lords.

There is another unusual feature about these cases. What these councils have apparently been doing is to force all existing employees—those in post before any agreement—to join or face dismissal. Even before our legislation most closed shop agreements exempted such employees from membership. But these local authorities—which profess concern for the job security of their staff—show no such restraint in their ideological pursuit of a 100 per cent. union membership.

Government action has not been confined to expressions of regret and sympathy. In 1980 we changed the law—as we said we would in our election manifesto. I must say to my noble friend Lord Brookes and to the noble Lord, Lord Harris of High Cross, that we have not broken faith with our manifesto as my noble friend appeared to imply. We did not make a manifesto commitment to outlaw the closed shop. Perhaps we should have done so, and perhaps we shall still do so; but we did not do so at that time. We said we would change the law to seek to protect individuals who suffered under closed shops and who suffered under the greatly extended immunities for union activitity which the previous Government had brought about. That was the extent of our manifesto commitment in 1979.

Until last year, until the Employment Act became law, these councils would have been able to proceed, without any risk of legal action, to dismiss nonunionists—except in the very rare case of the person who objected on religious grounds to membership of any union whatsoever. But in the Employment Act we made it unfair in legal terms to dismiss employees who were not union members when a closed shop is introduced. Indeed, the Act provides a legal remedy against any action by an employer to compel such an employee to join a union. There is no question, in the 1980 Act, of this employee needing conscientious objections—the fact that he was an existing employee is enough.

I do not think, therefore, that we can argue that in this case there are difficult legal issues. It is a simple question of fact. Were the employees in their jobs before the closed shop was introduced and have they declined to join the union? in these circumstances, while of course it must be up to the individual to decide whether or not to use his new rights, I have little doubt as to what would be the outcome if he does. I urge anyone who is dismissed to take his case to an industrial tribunal as the law provides.

My Lords, it has been said that this case shows that the remedies provided by our law are not sufficient to deter employers and unions, or to recompense the employee. Legal remedies are often only a poor substitute for the enjoyment of a satisfying job without harrassment. We all recognise that. But this question of the adequacy of any remedy, where an individual's legal rights have been infringed, is a new one. It did not figure in our debates on the Employment Bill last year. What concerned the House then was how widely drawn the provisions should be. For example, should all dismissals for non-membership be unfair, or should dismissal law apply where closed shops had not been reviewed?

In many of the speeches then, it was taken for granted that the remedies which the law provides in cases of unfair dismissal would be sufficient, these are not insignificant. The law provides for compensation and orders of reinstatement; and if an employer unreasonably refuses to comply with a reinstatement order then he can be penalised by an additional sum, up to a year's salary for the employee concerned. Certainly, employers generally do not find the dismissal remedies a matter of no significance—indeed, in the wider context of dismissals generally, they complain that they can be only too effective as deterrents. And in fact, while the particular examples which are the subject of this debate are very shocking, I hope that they will remain isolated ones. We certainly have no evidence that they are reflecting the experience of industry, whether private or public sector industry, as distinct from cases where political motivation is involved.

The fact that these were local authorities—where councillors do not pick up the bill for their unjustifiable actions—is of course important. But I am glad to say that the district auditor can intervene if unreasonable decisions lead to unwarranted expenditure for the ratepayer, like compensation for obviously unfair dismissal. The local district auditor for Sandwell has said in the local paper:— If councillors have ignored advice and acted recklessly or irresponsibly then they can be taken to court to get the money due from them". Quite bluntly, that means that, if the appropriate legal actions are taken, councillors like Councillor John Edwards could suffer the consequences of their own actions in their own pockets.

I am not suprised that these cases, even if they are exceptional, isolated or ideologically motivated, have revived demands to make the closed shop unlawful. I of course understand that demand. I must point out that making a closed shop void and unlawful might not be able to stop an employer like Sandwell which is already infringing employees' rights by forcing them to join a union, from bringing unfair pressures to bear or behaving wickedly.

Indeed, the whole problem connected with this issue of the closed shop. particularly so far as the present Administration is concerned, is that our experience in 1971 when closed shops were made unlawful indicated to us that this drove the practices underground. The fact that the practices were driven underground made it impossible to protect or compensate individuals who suffered under them. The whole difficulty of outlawing the closed shop is that you need the co-operation of the employers, and employers sometimes withhold that co-operation. It was the noble Lord, Lord Brookes, himself, who has been very critical of us, who said: In this matter management does not necessarily have clean hands". I also understand the demand for a remedy of enforced reinstatement in closed shop cases. This is what Miss Joanna Harris wanted. She did not want money; she wanted her job back. But we have all recognised, I think, that in the last analysis in an open society it is very difficult to force people to work together by law. In a situation where union members refuse to work with a non-unionist—and the 1971 legislation did throw up such cases—the courts themselves have recognised that enforced reinstatement simply will not work. Indeed the law has never enforced the specific performance of a contract of employment. Damages have always been the traditional remedy, and that is why in this case the law provides the method of redress so that if an action is successfully brought the result is monetary compensation rather than prescribed reinstatement. That is why I again urge people to use any current remedies which do provide for reinstatement orders and for compensation if they are not applied. We want to see that these legal remedies are effective, and that includes their deterrent effect. We shall certainly want to bear cases like Sandwell in mind as we continue to review the law; and we are continuing to review it, publicly and in this House—for instance, in only a week's time, when we have a debate in the name of my noble friend Lord Renton on our Green Paper on trade union immunities.

Finally, may I turn to specific questions which were asked of me? The noble Lord, Lord Rochester, asked me about a ballot at Sandwell. Our understanding is that there was a ballot of union members, but the non-union members were not given a chance to vote and the union ballot was of course held before the 1980 Act came into effect. On the issue of whether other non-unionists have been affected, in February when my Secretary of State saw Miss Harris, he himself met two other non-unionists. According to press reports, it seems that about 50 others may have been involved. We are not sure how many of them may have joined since, but, so far as we know, none has been drummed out for non-membership other than Miss Harris. However, they may, as the noble Lord, Lord Harris of High Cross, pointed out, have felt themselves forced to yield to this very wicked pressure.

May I also turn to the case of the Darlington council, which was raised by the noble Lord, Lord Rochester? That council is requiring contractors who wish to remain on its tendering list to sign a statement saying that it employs only union members. Without any qualification, we condemn that action as thoroughly immoral. We have expressed our concern about this type of practice before, and in this House we accepted an amendment to the Employment Act in the name of my noble friend Lord De La Warr which means that an employer who insists on such a requirement in a commercial contract can be made to reimburse to a contractor any compensation that contractor has had to pay to any of the employees dismissed as a result; and our code of practice makes that quite clear. Darlington is ignoring this advice. In the Government's view, what they are doing could well constitute an anti-competitive practice within the meaning of the Competition Act, which the Government also passed last year, because their action prevents firms which might otherwise have submitted tenders to the council from submitting those tenders. Indeed, as I understand the position, out of some 50 contractors who were originally on Darlington's tendering list for house building, fewer than five could meet the council's requirement.

When there is thought to be an anti-competitive practice, the Director General of Fair Trading may conduct an investigation and subsequently an order may be made prohibiting such practices. I know that the Federation of Civil Engineering Contractors have had some involvement with what is going on in Darlington and I do urge them and all others with an interest in this matter to let the Director General of Fair Trading know of their concern if they have not already done so.

May I in ending say to my noble friend Lord Brookes as uncompromisingly as I can that I do not defend and never have defended the closed shop? The Government would much prefer there not to be closed shops, but we cannot just wish away an institution which has grown up during our history and which now covers in excess of 5 million employees. We are determined to try to see that any legislation we put on the statute book will actually be observed, but we shall want to bear in mind continuously cases of abuse of our own or of previous legislation, with a view to changing the law should that become necessary. I shall certainly want to bear in mind throughout the period of consultation on our Green Paper on trade union immunities the cases which the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, has made available to us in this debate. I am therefore most grateful to him for the opportunity he has given me and the House to consider those cases, and we shall take serious note of everything he and others have said today.

7.7 p.m.

Lord Harris of Greenwich

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Earl for the characteristic thoroughness with which he has dealt with the issues I raised in my speech and which were raised by other noble Lords, to whom I should also like to tender my gratitude for having spoken.

I hope I will not appear unreasonable if I cavil slightly at some of the terms in the noble Earl's answer, particularly on two points. One of them I did not give him advance notice of, and therefore I am in no position to complain. But I believe that the question raised by the Secretary of State himself—namely, the question of unlawful conduct—should be referred to the Law Officers of the Crown for their view, because I believe (I have taken advice on this point) that there are certain ways in which decisions by local authorities could be challenged by way of an injunction.

What I think virtually everybody who has spoken, with the exception of the noble Lord, Lord Bruce of Donington, has said is that it is simply not good enough to give Miss Harris and others in a similar position financial compensation. I think what we all feel—and I suspect this is also the view of many who have not spoken, and indeed perhaps of the overwhelming majority of your Lordships' House, and also, I suspect, the overwhelming majority of British public opinion— is that people should not be chucked out of their jobs like this by ideologically-motivated members of a union. Therefore, I would say to the noble Earl—and I hope he will bear this in mind in the consideration he and his right honourable friend are going to give to their Green Paper—that I entirely take notice of some part of the argument about enforced reinstatement; but I believe (I do not want to go into all sorts of complications in differentiating between different groups of employers, be they private employers or local authorities) that it is necessary to look at this in a rather new light.

As the noble Lord, Lord Brookes, has pointed out, and indeed it is fairly common ground and has been mentioned by the noble Earl himself, there has been no great demand from the employees of the Sandwell District Council that they should have a closed shop policy. There has been no pressure from them: the pressure quite clearly came from the members of the local authority. Therefore, if there was, let us say, a requirement that there should be enforced reinstatement there would be none of the attendant difficulties and problems of the kind which were perfectly reasonably outlined by the Minister of State at the end of his speech. However, I should be grateful if he would look into the point of the law officers, and, no doubt, we can be in correspondence on that.

If I may briefly touch on one or two of the other speeches, the noble Lord, Lord Rochester, made a point of fundamental importance, that virtually every public opinion poll that we have seen in the last four or five years demonstrates that the overwhelming majority of trade unionists and their wives are as affronted by conduct of this kind as are all other elements of British public opinion. I have no doubt at all about that. The noble Lord Lord Brookes gave us an extremely disturbing account, based on his own knowledge of the situation in West Bromwich, of how these ballots were conducted. I think it raises exactly the kind of issue which was touched on by the Minister of State himself. There are grave questions about the behaviour both of the councillors and of some of the officials concerned.

The noble Lord, Lord Harris of High Cross, who raised the question of whether this was, indeed, unlawful conduct, agreed that what was present there was unfair dismissal. All I would say about that is that, if a local authority consciously, deliberately, sets about dismissing someone unfairly, according to the law of this country, there is absolutely no doubt that if financial compensation is awarded the district auditor should have an interest in the case, and I very much hope that he will take a keen personal interest in what develops here.

Lastly, coming to the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Bruce of Donington, all I would say to him is this. He had a difficult speech to make. He, not unreasonably, pointed out—and he was entirely right in what he said—that I was a Minister in the previous Government. In fact, he asked—he did not put the matter quite as abrasively as this, but perhaps I can do so on his behalf—why did I not resign if I felt quite as strongly as that. I would say to him that he has—

Lord Bruce of Donington

My Lords, may I interrupt the noble Lord for just a moment? I did not ask—the noble Lord will be able to ascertain this from Hansard—why did he not resign? I asked: why did he not protest at the time?

Lord Harris of Greenwich

My Lords, so far as I am aware, I was never on a ministerial committee that considered this matter. That is the answer to the question. It affects Ministers of all Governments. It, no doubt, affected some of my former noble friends when they came into the Chamber to listen to me speaking on behalf of the Home Office. Ministers have to accept collective responsibility. Nevertheless, the fact is certainly clear that I was a member of a Government which did a number of things in the area of trade union reform, which I find, looking back on them, were highly distasteful, to put it at the very least. I must accept a measure of personal responsibility for having continued in office as a member of that Government.

The House will be relieved to know that I now come to my final point. The noble Lord, Lord Bruce of Donington, did not put it in precisely these terms, but, basically, he asked: what, really, is all the fuss about? After all, hardship can be dealt with by the industrial tribunal. He made some reference to the fact that Miss Harris had a grandfather who might have settled some money on her and, rather like the noble Earl, Lord Gowrie, I find the relevance of that rather difficult to follow. Nevertheless, the answer to the noble Lord is this. I think that this House and Parliament should take an interest when a girl of 20 is hounded by a number of ideologically-motivated councillors and trade union officials and driven out of her job, as Miss Harris has been driven out of her job. It will be a sad day for British democracy when issues of this kind are not raised in Parliament and when redress is not demanded. With that, I beg leave to withdraw the Motion.

Motion for Papers, by leave, withdrawn.