Tag Archives: trade unions

Amendment to earlier blog post: Are the Conservatives ‘now the Party of Work’? The Trade Union Bill suggests not…

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Professor Michael Ford QC joined the Bristol law School in 2015 and specialises in labour law, human rights and public law.

Professor Michael Ford QC joined the Bristol law School in 2015 and specialises in labour law, human rights and public law.

Tonia Novitz is Professor of Labour Law, specialising in labour law, international trade and human rights.

Tonia Novitz is Professor of Labour Law, specialising in labour law, international trade and human rights.

Since Tonia and Michael’s last blog of 12 October 2015, the Government has now abandoned proposed restrictions on unions’ freedom of protest away from the workplace, probably because even the police did not identify a problem with the existing legal framework (see the response to consultation). But the government still wishes to amend the Code of Practice on picketing to cover e.g. intimidation on the picket line and the ‘responsible’ use of social media in strikes, with uncertain legal effect. No wonder the Trade Union Bill has been opposed not only by trade unions, such as Unison and Unite, but also by human rights NGOs. See for example the Joint Statement by Liberty, the British Institute of Human Rights, and Amnesty International.

The original blog follows.

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Are Conservatives ‘now the party of work’? The Trade Union Bill suggests not…

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Professor Michael Ford QC joined the Bristol law School in 2015 and specialises in labour law, human rights and public law.

Professor Michael Ford QC joined the Bristol law School in 2015 and specialises in labour law, human rights and public law.

Tonia Novitz is Professor of Labour Law, specialising in labour law, international trade and human rights.

Tonia Novitz is Professor of Labour Law, specialising in labour law, international trade and human rights.

On 5 October 2015, George Osborne declared that the Conservative are ‘now the party of work, the only true party of labour’. The Trade Union Bill presented to Parliament in July 2015 demonstrates the hollowness of this claim. This proposed legislation has had little attention from the media but promises to place alarming restrictions on the rights of workers and their trade unions, probably in anticipation of deep budgetary cuts affecting the public sector which are, of course, likely to generate protest…

The measures in the Bill include: changes to the already very strict balloting requirements on strikes; new restrictions on peaceful picketing; new rules on the political activity of trade unions; restrictions on trade unions’ facility time in the public sector (with check off also in the Government’s sights); and greater controls on trade unions by the Certification Office. At the same time, the Government has published draft regulations allowing employers to hire agency workers as strike-breakers, and proposes further restrictions on protests organised by trade unions.

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