Please move this motion in your union branch or trades council
This [union organisation/conference] notes the Employment Rights Bill moved by the new Labour government.
We welcome any improvements to workers’ rights and conditions.
This includes the promise to repeal some of the more recent Tory anti-union legislation, the Minimum Service Levels Act 2023 and the undemocratic industrial action ballot thresholds enshrined in the Trade Union Act 2016.
However, this [union organisation/conference] believes that most of the improvements set out by the Employment Rights Bill are to individual rights of workers rather than collective ones.
A key part of this is leaving most of the Tory anti-union laws intact, including the right for workers and unions to take solidarity action.
There is also insufficient strengthening of collective bargaining, a key element in improving workers’ rights after decades of erosion under successive governments.
This [union organisation/conference] believes that the Bill leaves loopholes that bosses will exploit regarding ‘fire and rehire’ and ‘zero-hour contracts’
We also believe that there is an unacceptable delay in the implementation of the Bill, especially regarding the repeal of anti-union legislation.
This [union organisation/conference] calls on our union NEC to:-
- Demand that the TUC implements TUC 2024 Congress policy to call a special congress to review the Bill and demand its strengthening
- Draw up a list of workers’ rights as amendments to the Employment Rights Bill
- Ensure that this includes repeal of all the Tory anti-union legislation. As a minimum, the promised repeal of the Minimum Service Levels Act 2023 and the undemocratic industrial action ballot thresholds in the Trade Union Act 2016 should be separated from the Employment Rights Bill and immediately voted through parliament as fast-tracked legislation
- Ensure that the list of amendments also includes: the total abolition of ‘fire and rehire’ and ‘zero-hour contracts’, for a £15-an-hour minimum wage with no age exemptions, and collective bargaining for all workers
- Table this list of amendments to the parliamentary group of our union, and which should involve Jeremy Corbyn, the Independent Alliance MPs and the seven Labour MPs suspended for voting to remove the two-child benefit cap, to be moved in parliament
- Raise at the TUC and with all other unions that this workers’ manifesto, along with opposition to any austerity measures proposed by the Labour government, should be the basis for a national campaign by the union movement, including potential industrial action