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10.42 am
Mr. Archy Kirkwood (Roxburgh and Berwickshire): I am pleased to take part in the debate. I was honoured by the invitation of the hon. Member for Gravesham (Mr. Pond) to sponsor the Bill, and pay tribute to him for using the opportunity afforded to him to introduce it and for his model consultation exercise beforehand. Those of us who know him expected nothing less. He has given an excellent example of how to proceed. The House is indebted to him for that process and for bringing forward this important Bill.
I join the hon. Member in paying tribute to the Low Pay Unit. From a Scottish point of view, I also pay tribute to the work of the university of Paisley in bringing forward some of the research that has led to the Bill.
I was taken aback when I examined some of the background to the Bill. The Library briefing was particularly instructive. I did not know that the House had taken so long to revisit this important subject--the most recent deliberative examination was in 1933. A House of Commons that is too busy to examine such issues is too busy full stop. In anticipation of the establishment of a Parliament in Edinburgh in 1999, I think that decentralisation might reduce the overload of business in the House and it might not be such an unconscionably long time before we return to the issue.
Even if the Bill achieves nothing else, the hon. Member for Gravesham has contributed to the important educational process of bringing the issue into the public domain and giving it the attention that it needs. I understand that there are some difficulties with the Bill. I hope that the Minister will say what the Government think about that. However, raising the issue has been an important service. The publicity that it has generated has forced me and many others to re-examine the matter. I hope that the Government will give the Bill careful consideration. It is important for a new Administration to review all such legislation carefully and prudently and come up with a coherent response. I do not know why the Government cannot accept the Bill in principle and promise to enshrine it in law. I do not know what that would cost them.
I listened carefully to the hon. Member for South-East Cambridgeshire (Mr. Paice). I agree that those of us from rural constituencies have a different perspective from those representing places such as Islington, although I pay tribute to the work that the hon. Member for Islington, North (Mr. Corbyn) has done on the subject. He is right to keep our thoughts focused on the wider canvas, but half a loaf is better than no bread. None of the minimum standards set in the Bill preclude International Labour Organisation conventions in the longer term. I understand the hon. Gentleman's impatience and frustration. Improvements could be made in Committee to ensure more flexibility on the employment of children in a rural context. That is different from factory-driven sweated labour for 13-year-olds.
Getting the balance right is important. Knowing the hon. Member for Gravesham as I do, I am confident that he will be assiduous in paying attention to the detailed and balanced points that are being made today. Friday debates are more meaningful and constructive than many of our debates during the rest of the week. Flexibility and decentralisation are important, but the Government must make their position clear this morning. I hope that the Minister will give us an idea of the time scale that the Government have in mind on this important process.
The framework should be set in a Europewide context. As the single market develops, it is increasingly important to establish common minimum standards for decent pay and safe working conditions for children. We must ensure that our European sister democracies are as assiduous as we are in enforcing framework rules. The European Union is ahead of us in legislating on the issue. It is a shame that we are behind. I hope that the Minister will use our current presidency to promote some of the ideas being discussed today to ensure common standards and levels of enforcement throughout the United Kingdom.
The framework set out in the Bill is right. We must introduce a system of work permits so that the home, the school and the employer can agree about acceptable working conditions. The other half of the equation is a system of monitoring and enforcement that involves local authorities.
The hon. Member for Islington, North said that, on the whole, local authorities have a poor record of monitoring enforcement. That is generally true. However, local authorities would say in their defence that Parliament is for ever laying duties and responsibilities on their shoulders. Local authorities' failure to fulfil those responsibilities is often due to not a lack of will but a lack of resources. It should not be up to the hon. Member for Gravesham to say that he needs hundreds of thousands, or even millions of pounds--I do not know what it would cost--because we all have a duty in this regard. I am not making a narrow point. It is all very well for Parliament to pass good and onerous measures, but if we do not will the means it is pointless trying to will the ends.
Mr. Corbyn:
The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right: unless we provide the finances that enable local authorities to carry out proper control and inspection functions, they will not happen. It is not that local authorities do not want to undertake those duties: they simply do not have the resources. Representatives of social services and child welfare departments from many local authorities tell me that they can barely cope with the statutory requirements for children at risk, never mind examining the plight of children who are being exploited in employment.
Mr. Kirkwood:
I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention, which reinforces what I have said. I am sure that the hon. Member for Gravesham is well aware of that fact, given his experience in this area. We join the Minister in seeking to win some extra resources from the Treasury--I am sure that he, with his powers of persuasion, is well able to do that. I hope that he will make that commitment--I shall certainly help him in any way I can.
I encourage young people to take on employment. I know that there are problems with poor working conditions, sweated labour and so on, but I believe that properly organised work in a controlled and safe environment is a positive experience for young people. It is important that the Bill be enacted quickly before the introduction of the minimum wage--which I support, subject to certain standards and safeguards. If we require employers to pay their employees a minimum of £3.50 or £3.60 an hour, unscrupulous employers or those at the margins of the law may be inclined to employ more young people in order to avoid their legislative requirements. Legislation such as the Employment of Children Bill was necessary before, but it is even more urgent now. It must be in place before the widespread implementation of the minimum wage.
It is essential that the House takes steps to ensure that young people know their rights. The present rules are clearly a mess; the legislation has fallen into disregard, disrepute and desuetude. That is a matter of real concern. We need to establish clear rules and ensure that they stick. Everyone must abide by them.
I support young people's right to participate in a positive employment experience during the school year. The hon. Member for South-East Cambridgeshire referred to work experience. My local authority in south-east Scotland is making positive use of work experience for young people, particularly during school holidays. I am sure that the hon. Member for Gravesham will take that matter on board.
I found my experience in preparing this Bill very beneficial. I did not appreciate the extent to which young people work in this country: 2 million children are a huge part of our young population. I did not realise that the laws of the land were in such a bad way. It is essential that we recognise that conditions have changed completely since 1933. The Sunday experience is one example. The social outlook regarding Sundays, particularly in areas such as mine, has changed dramatically.
Audrey Wise (Preston):
My hon. Friend the Member for Gravesham (Mr. Pond) talked about illegal employment, and we join him in deploring that. However, I do not wish people to think that simply legalising work or allowing legal work to continue will make everything all right. Even if the Bill were enacted and fully enforced--and that is a very big "if"--we would still be looking with equanimity at appallingly long working hours for children.
A child's workplace is, and should be, the school. We should view 12 hours' paid employment not in isolation, but in the context of the school week, having regard to homework and the extra demands that are placed on children all the time. A legal 12-hour working limit would simply confer respectability on an excessive practice. A 13-year-old child in my constituency who attends a typical high school has a 32½-hour school week, with six hours of homework plus possibly 12 hours' legal work. That is not good enough. It amounts to a 50½-hour working week for a 13-year-old.
We are told that half a loaf is better than none--I do not see why, in 1998, we must talk in terms of half loaves when it comes to the protection and development of our children. A child of 13 must do his work at school while he is developing physically, mentally and emotionally. Labour Members are completely convinced of the correctness of the maximum 48-hour working week for adults, yet we are proposing 50½ hours' work for a 13-year-old.
A 15-year-old attending a typical school in my constituency--it is not a particularly pushy school, but a normal school which seeks to bring out the best in its pupils--would have 15 hours of homework. If that 15-year-old were also employed for 12 hours, it would increase his working week to nearly 60 hours. I do not see why we should head down that road in 1998. It is not good enough to say that it is a step in the right direction or that half a loaf is better than none. It is not I who would be eating that half loaf: it would be the youngsters. I believe that they should have a full loaf.
I am one of the few hon. Members whose working life started at 15 years of age. I am not talking about a holiday job, but a proper job. I did not have to go to school and work 40 hours or more on top of that: my working hours as an employed 15-year-old were a lot less. My work gave me opportunities to develop physically and intellectually. We should not be satisfied with talk of steps in the right direction.
My hon. Friend the Member for Gravesham rightly referred to the extent of illegal working, but employers get away with it because the present laws are feeble and are not enforced, and the penalties are inadequate. Can we be sure that this legislation would be enforced? I think not, especially as no extra resources would be provided. My solution to the problem is simple. We should enact legislation in line with International Labour Organisation convention 138, which would prohibit employment of children under school-leaving age. That would be infinitely easier to enforce.
The Bill is incredibly complex. It contains lists of what is and is not permitted. Incidentally, I am not sure why it is thought that waitressing is light work and suitable for a 13-year-old. It is a very hard job, as is car washing. The proposed enforcement and licensing system is complex. If we cannot enforce present laws, I do not see how we shall enforce these provisions. It would be much easier to enforce a simple adherence to ILO convention 138.
The Bill could affect the relationship between home and school. My hon. Friend the Member for Gravesham pointed out that some kids have to supplement the family income, and that the only worker in some families is a 13-year-old. Under the Bill, if the school thinks that work would interfere with a child's education, it should not agree to a work permit. That would put schools in a
delicate position in their relationship with parents. Schools are already pressed and have suffered staff cuts, so they are in no position to undertake this addition to their work.
I am sceptical about the Bill for the child's sake. I also do not approve of children being used as cheap labour. At a time when 16-year-olds cannot obtain work, why should 13-year-olds be so eagerly sought by employers? The answer is that they are cheap. If there is so much work to be done that we need the labour of 13-year-olds, 14-year-olds and 15-year-olds, who already have full-time school work, why are 16-year-olds unemployed? Even the welfare-to-work system, which I support, does not come into operation until the kid has been unemployed for six months. That is an implicit acknowledgement of the level of youth unemployment. There is youth exploitation through the use of cheap labour of 13 to 15-year-olds, and youth unemployment after the age of 16. That is an untenable situation. Kids should not be exploited as cheap labour when their proper work is at school. I do not accept that working excessive hours is character building; nor should we excuse it, given the extent of adult unemployment.
The Bill's complexity is not my hon. Friend's fault: it is bound to be complex because it tries to reconcile impossible and contradictory objectives. It tries to protect children while allowing them to work far too long and be a supply of cheap labour. I agreed with a great deal of what my hon. Friend said, but I was disquieted when he explained that the 12-hour limit was carefully chosen to allow two newspaper deliveries and another job at weekends. That is not the way in which to decide how many hours our children should work.
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