Tories vow to rip up workers’ rights package
The Conservative Party will rip up Labour’s contentious workers’ rights overhaul if they are elected in a bid “once again” to convince voters it is the party of business.
In a speech to business leaders on Thursday, shadow business secretary Andrew Griffith will warn attendees the Employment Rights Bill will hand “enormous power” to trade unions who will “grind the economy to a halt”.
“The work to once again make the Conservative Party the party of business begins today,” he will add. “There is no way back to government without this. It won’t be easy, and it will not be done with sugar rush or press release politics.”
Currently being scrutinised by Parliament, the government’s Employment Rights Bill has been hailed by ministers as the “biggest upgrade to workers’ rights in a generation”.
It formed a key part of the Labour Party’s pre-election pitch to voters, promising popular measures like outlawing so-called fire and rehire practices and banning ‘exploitative’ zero-hours contracts.
But more punitive measures – including new rules around statutory sick pay and bolstered employee rights from day one – have triggered widespread unease among UK plc, and warnings it could leave business owners on the end of vexatious lawsuits.
‘Deeply damaging’ workers’ rights package
In April, all five of the UK’s largest business lobby groups co-signed a letter to every member of the House of Lords chastising the Bill as “deeply damaging” to firms’ operating landscape and households’ living standards.
“Our collective position is that… the Bill will have deeply damaging implications for the government’s priority growth mission as well as their admirable focus on tackling rising economic inactivity,” the group of industry bodies wrote in a rare intervention. “Taken together, [the policies are] a recipe for damaging, not raising livings standards.”
Griffith, who served as City minister and science minister while the Tories were in office, will dub the overhaul the “unemployment bill”, and say the government’s own figures concede the suite of measures will cost British businesses £5bn a year.
He will also pledge to unveil a ‘backing business advisory board”, which will help craft the Conservative Party’s pro-business policymaking while it is in opposition.
“In a complete inversion of the Labour cabinet, everyone on [the board] will have worked in or set up a business,” he is expected to say. “With their guidance we will finally wield the scythe against the red tape that holds businesses back and makes us poorer.”