HL Deb 07 March 1991 vol 526 cc1558-60

7.33 p.m.

Viscount Ullswater rose to move that the draft order laid before the House on 19th February be approved [12th Report from the Joint Committee.]

The noble Viscount said: My Lords, this order, which is being made under powers in Section 149 of the Employment Protection (Consolidation) Act 1978, is concerned with the basis on which redundancy payments are calculated in the field of local government service. It amends the Redundancy Payments (Local Government) Modification Order which the House approved in July 1983. The 1983 order was previously amended in 1985 to take account of changes arising from the Local Government Act 1985 and has been amended again in each of the past three years, bringing in several bodies that were omitted in 1983 and 1985 or had since come into existence. We now have to undertake a further tidying up to bring in Scottish Enterprise and the General Teaching Council for Scotland and to replace the Local Government Training Board with the Local Government Management Board.

I should explain that under the provisions of Part VI of the 1978 Act an employee who is discharged as redundant after at least two years' service is entitled to be paid a redundancy payment calculated, among other things, according to his period of continuous service with his last employer. Local authorities and related institutions are legally distinct employers, so that on the strict basis of the statutory scheme on its own an employee would be entitled to a payment every time he became redundant even though he intended to move on to a post elsewhere in local government.

All this, however, would not properly reflect the realities of local government service, in which a normal career progression commonly involves moving from one authority to another, perhaps several times during an individual's working life. Local government collective agreements therefore provide for local authorities to base their redundancy payments on total aggregated service in local government, and the 1983 order secures a similar effect in the statutory redundancy scheme by replacing service with one employer with total "relevant local government service".

Unfortunately, there is no convenient and all-embracing definition of what constitutes local government employment. It is therefore necessary to list in the order all the employing authorities and bodies with whom service counts as local government service. Two lists are necessary. The first, in Schedule 1 to the 1983 order, lists those employers currently in being by whom anyone may be made redundant. The second, in the appendix to Schedule 2 in the same order, lists those bodies which may have ceased to exist, but with which service may still be reckoned for redundancy purposes.

This amending order is essentially a tidying up measure, it simply adds to the lists in Schedule 1 of the 1983 order bodies which have come into existence since the last amendment was made, or were previously omitted, and makes one deletion. The number of employees likely to be affected is very small.

I trust that I have said enough to satisfy your Lordships that these are necessary and innocuous amendments. I commend the order to your Lordships.

Moved, That the draft order laid before the House on 19th February be approved. [12th Report, from the Joint Committee]—(Viscount Ullswater.)

Baroness Turner of Camden

My Lords, I rise to thank the Minister for his very clear exposition of the order. As he says, it is a tidying up measure. It appears to me to be totally innocuous with very few people involved. In those circumstances, I offer no objection to the order.

Lord Rochester

My Lords, on these Benches we too are pleased to approve the order.

Viscount Ullswater

My Lords, I am most grateful for the words of the noble Baroness and the noble Lord.

On Question, Motion agreed to.