§ Mr. Hefferasked the Secretary of State for Employment what is the cause of the dispute between the Civil and Public Services Association and his Department regarding the fortnightly payment of unemployment benefits; why it has come to the point of a strike at four employment offices, including Walton, Liverpool; and what steps he is taking to ensure that such a strike does not take place which would seriously affect unemployed people in the areas concerned, especially as sympathetic action is likely to be considered by workers employed in the Department of Health and Social Security offices.
§ Mr. BoothI told the House on 15th May that the Government were in favour of a fortnightly system of attendance and payment of unemployment benefit but had decided that the pilot procedures needed refinement, particularly to minimise overpayment and opportunities for fraud and abuse—to which the CPSA themselves have attached importance—and that regulations would be brought before the House to allow the pilot scheme to continue for a further period. These draft regulations are currently being considered by the National Insurance Advisory Committee, to whom the CPSA has 259W made its views known, and we hope to bring the regulations to the House before the recess.
However, although the report earlier this year on the pilot experiment by a joint working party of management and staff—including CPSA representatives—showed that staff and claimants in the pilot offices were generally in favour of the system, the CPSA are opposing the continuation of the pilot scheme as part of its campaign to get the Government to change their decision to limit the growth of Civil Service manpower. It has called a one-week strike beginning next Monday of its members in a number of the pilot offices operating the fortnightly procedures—including those at Walton in Liverpool, Cumbernauld, Burton-on-Trent and Widnes. I understand that it hopes thereby to influence the National Insurance Advisory Committee and eventually Parliament to reject the draft regulations.
The Government have fully consulted and involved the CPSA at all stages. When the system is extended generally, there will be, in addition to an improvement in services to claimants, savings in money and manpower, but the existing permanent staff have been given a pledge that there will be no redundancies resulting from the introduction of this scheme. In any event, all that the proposed regulations would do is to continue the pilot scheme without any changes in staffing. There is therefore no question of the interests or jobs of CPSA members being put at risk through the general introduction of fortnightly payment, let alone by the continuance of the present experiment. If they proceed with their action it will cause inconvenience and hardship to claimants in the areas concerned.
I have personally made this plain to the general secretary of the CPSA and have expressed to him the view that, while the CPSA is fully entitled to express its views on all aspects of the scheme, the legal entitlements of claimants are a matter for Government and Parliament to decide and that the CPSA ought not to seek to further its views by taking industrial action which will in this instance disrupt the service to claimants. I therefore asked that the CPSA should call off this strike action.
I very much regret to say that not only has this plea been rejected, but that the CPSA has refused my further request that 260W it should co-operate in making arrangements to minimise the risk of hardship to claimants. My Department will do its utmost in the areas concerned to reduce delays in payment of unemployment benefit, but without the co-operation of the striking staff I cannot guarantee that there will not be hardship to some claimants.