Lord Bragg (Lab): My Lords, it is a great pleasure to congratulate my noble friend

Lord Watts on his maiden speech. I agree with every word of itthat helpsand
clearly with the influence of Liverpool above all. Local government, the House of
Commons and chairing the PLPwow. That is enough of an introduction to this
place, and I hope that he intervenes a great deal more often.
On Sir Christopher Wrens tomb in St Pauls Cathedral, as I am sure noble Lords
will know, there is an inscription that reads, Si monumentum requiris,
circumspiceIf you seek a monument, look around. I would say that the same
thing has happened today in this House. Look around at the monument of
opinions of so many in this House of unparalleled experience and expertise in
this matter, and listen to the quality, pinpoint detail and strength of their
objections to the Bill. It has been dismantled. Their voices have allies all over the
country. The senior political adviser at CIPD said:
We do not really see the need for legislation on this topic.
Liberty, Amnesty International and the British Institute of Human Rights argue
that the Bill would undermine the rights of all working people. Some 70 local
authorities and NHS employers have publicly criticised it.
Why are the unions the only organisation in the UK legally required to hold
postal-only ballots, which tend to be more expensive and lead to lower turnouts?
Why is it so rarely said that unionised workplaces are safer places and that union
representatives play a big role in improving morale? Yet this Government seem
to believe, in an ancient way, that the trade union movement is some sort of
demon dragon in our society that needs to be made toothless.
For centuries, this countryas others, but we are talking about ourselves
todayhas suffered from damaging splits between the powerful, the less
powerful and the powerless. We have had slaves over the centuries, serfs,
indented servants and unsecured labour, all dominated by the hydra-headed
powerful. There is a sense in which that chasmic characteristic still obtains.
National characteristics persist, and the powerful and the privileged, often in new
shapes and forms, have fought very hard indeed to hold on to their power and
privileges. Only an organised power of at least equal determination can curtail
and civilise such entrenched autocracies, as my noble friend Lord Watts referred
to in his excellent speech.
Until comparatively recentlya mere 100 years agowe have had bestial
housing, the herding of insecure workforces and a life for most of the people in
this country that was nasty, brutish and short. This was often at times when we
were among the richest countriessometimes the very richestnot only in the
world then, but perhaps which the world had hitherto ever seen. That has
changed, but only because of constant struggle. It has been helped by honoured
men and women of all classes, and of all political and religious persuasions and
none, but it was the trade union movement that got a grip on it in the late 19th
century and established a foundation on which a fairer society could exist, in
which many more shared in economic prosperity and in which many more than
ever before had opportunities to improve their condition. Many more could live a
life worth living, instead of being humiliated, discounted and degraded.
Lest we forget: just as we pay our dues to the continuing stabilising influence of
the Queen and this parliamentary system in our constitutional democracy, and

just as we respect hard-won victories in the law and the Armed Forces, so we
need to bear in mind and honour what the trade unions have done and still do for
our society. These men and women gave to millions over the centuries a life
unimaginable to them beforehand. To merely demonise them is unworthy. We
owe them a great debt. Of course, at times the unions have seemed unreasonable
and implacable, and sometimes appear to be bent on frustrated wrecking as the
only way they can expedite change. But that is not the greater part of their
historynot a bit of it. Their achievement has been to liberate and improve the lot
of the mass of the British people. That is what they have done.
Let us compare the other side, because we have two sides here. What about the
great controllers: government and management? What have they contributed
along the way? How did management and government manage to lose the basis
and guts of what, until the middle of the last century, was one of the greatest
manufacturing conurbations in the world? How did British management and
government, for instance, lose our mighty shipbuilding industry when other
comparable countries kept or improved theirs? It was not only the unions that
were intransigent and incompetent, so why has an island that has built ships
since the time of Alfred the Great managed to kill off such a major tradition?
Where were the new ideas from our controllers and managers? Where was the
long-term investment? Where was there any understanding of the inevitable
economic and personal devastation? Where was the will to build anew? Where
was the leadership? Absent. And on what grounds was that wasting of other
great industries, especially in the north, leaving 3 million often highly skilled
people unemployed and without provision for their future? Has that ever been
convincingly justified by management or government?
We live in a country that is still lucky to have outstandingly clever people at all
levels of our society and in many disciplines. It is worth remembering that
arguably the greatest revolution in world history, the Industrial Revolution, which
founded our prosperity, started, flourished and conquered from here, and was
seeded and nourished by working men, most of whom had left school by the age
of 13 or l4. It is also worth reminding the House that today in science, thanks to
our universities, we are the second greatest research engine in the world.
It used to be said that we were a providential islanda special case. Indeed, for a
small place we have had, and still have, an extraordinaryperhaps unique
range of the highest talents across the waterfront throughout our history, save
one: we have not the talent to mend the rifts between the powerful and the
powerless, between them and usor them and uz, as the poet, Tony Harrison
saidand all the permutations of that. Why can we not merge these two forces
and each learn from the other and be prepared to respect, encourage and involve
the other? This is not a dream. Today we are a small island in a world which
demands bigger and bigger forces and commitments. We need creative parity:
instead, we have an unimaginative, unsympathetic, old class act. Instead of
exacerbating basic divisions in this country, which this Bill seeks to do, why
cannot the Government work out a well thought through, permanent structure for
a more equal playing field, with full contributions from all parts of our
increasingly diverse society? Why is there no vision, or any hope of that, in the
Bill? So many people want it to happen. It need not be so very difficultand, if it
is, it will be all the more rewarding to succeed. What I am saying may seem
simplistic and obvious and pie in the sky, but can anyone propose a better option

for bringing to an end this unjust, oppressive, regressive civil struggle? I look
forward to an amended Bill.

So, the governments own Human Rights watchdog the EHRC has said a number
of measures in the Bill may be a breach on the right to strike:
http://www.equalityhumanrights.com/commission-warns-trade-union-bill-couldbreach-people%E2%80%99s-human-rights