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Miss Kate Hoey (Vauxhall): Does the Secretary of State agree that it is an empty gesture to threaten to lift the monopoly? Does he realise the repercussions that that would have, particularly on rural areas? Does he not know that the dispute is almost settled? There is agreement on pay and working conditions, and only a minor amount remains to be agreed. He should not stand there posturing but should sit back and hope that the dispute will be settled. He should not interfere with genuine negotiations that are going on at this moment at ACAS.
Mr. Lang: I hope that the hon. Lady is right and that the dispute is almost over. If that is so, why does she not join me in asking the unions to call off their damaging series of strikes?
Mr. James Couchman (Gillingham): Does my right hon. Friend agree that this unnecessary strike, which appears to have much to do with a power struggle within the union, will lead to a loss of business, through the use of faxes, E-mail and other modern technologies, which may never be recovered?
Mr. Lang: My hon. Friend is right. As I said in my statement, the union is damaging the interests of its own work force. Since the last postal strike, there has been a substantial development of E-mail, fax machines and other means of communication. Every time that there is a serious dispute in the postal service, the Post Office loses substantial business, some of which never returns.
Mr. Tam Dalyell (Linlithgow): Will the President of the Board of Trade answer the factual point put by my right hon. Friend the Member for Derby, South (Mrs. Beckett)? Is it true that the unions had been at ACAS for only an hour when he made the announcement from the Front Bench?
Mr. Lang: I understand that the first ACAS involvement was on 17 July--last Wednesday--and the second was last Friday. The unions and the Post Office are speaking separately to ACAS this afternoon.
Mr. Robert G. Hughes (Harrow, West): In making this welcome statement, is not my right hon. Friend being a little unfair on the right hon. Member for Derby, South (Mrs. Beckett)? How can she be expected to take the side of business and the people of this country when later this week she will need the votes of all the trade union-paid poodles to elect her back to the shadow Cabinet?
Mr. Lang: That may be why the Labour party is being so coy about this matter. But the public have a right to know the Opposition's policy on industrial relations. If the spectre of the car park meeting, secondary picketing, secondary strikes, flying pickets and closed shops is to be resurrected, the electorate should know about it, and the sooner the better.
Mr. David Winnick (Walsall, North): Does the Secretary of State recognise that his statement will be regarded, and rightly so, as an act of sheer spite against the unions? He clearly took every opportunity to put the employer's side. Some Conservatives--the Secretary of State may be one--would like to see strikes in the public sector banned. Is it not a fundamental right in a democracy to tell one's employer that one does not want to go into work and that one has a right to strike? That is the point that we used to make against dictatorships. What about that right in Britain?
Mr. Lang: I am not taking the employer's point of view. I am not taking a side in this dispute. I am simply taking the side of the public interest, and it is time that those who operate a monopoly service recognised that they must take seriously their obligation to the public.
Mr. Douglas French (Gloucester): Is my right hon. Friend aware that his proposed suspension of the postal monopoly will be a welcome relief to the businesses that rely on the postal service to keep them in business--that is, for the receipt of orders and the execution of orders? His swift action to bring the matter to a head will be welcomed.
Mr. Lang: No one would pretend that the suspension of the monopoly will ensure that the service will continue in the way that the Post Office has operated it--this will be a second-best solution. However, if it enables at least some mail to get through, it will be better than nothing at all.
Mr. Dennis Skinner (Bolsover): Does the Secretary of State appreciate that this is a dispute, leading to a strike, in which the members of the union have a powerful case? Is he aware that they are trying to get rid of Saturday working? The Secretary of State, as a Member of Parliament, has voted in the House for Members to have a four-day week, to have Friday off, for 10 weeks a year. In this day and age, surely the people who deliver the mail have the right to a five-day week. I believe that they have a powerful case. Will the Secretary of State bear in mind the fact that a ballot was decided by Conservative Members of Parliament in debates in the House? It is a moderate union, putting a moderate case. We are beginning to see the real face of the Tory Government--Hitler and Mussolini banned strikes, which is what the Government would like to do.
Mr. Lang: The hon. Gentleman has got his facts wrong. The strike is not about Saturday working--it is about team working as an improved mechanism for sorting mail in the post offices, and about how much first-class mail should be delivered in the first delivery and how much should be delivered in the second delivery. These issues could easily be resolved by negotiation and good will on both sides, without the need to damage the public interest.
Sir Michael Shersby (Uxbridge): Is my right hon. Friend aware that many people in this country will regret the decision of the Post Office workers to take industrial action? Does he agree that today's decision may turn out to be an historic one? Perhaps it is time that this country addressed the question whether essential workers in the Post Office, on the tubes and in other areas should have the right to strike, or whether it might be better to replace this outmoded and outdated weapon by a negotiating board and arbitration.
Mr. Lang: I hear what my hon. Friend is saying, and he has expressed a point of view that is held in some quarters. The armed services, the police, prison officers and merchant seamen when at sea are not permitted to strike. These are issues where there are difficulties of definition, of enforcement and of the international law and our obligations under the International Labour Organisation. I have noted what my hon. Friend said, and I have no doubt that the debate will continue.
Mr. Tony Banks (Newham, North-West): The Secretary of State will be aware that the Government effectively own the Post Office and get about £400
million profit from its activities. Which other company, when faced with a dispute in its own organisation, would seek to destroy the organisation? That is precisely what the lifting of this monopoly is all about.
Post Office workers are not the best paid workers in the world. We owe them more than perhaps any other group of workers for the services that they give us as Members of Parliament. We should be supporting them. They will see the lifting of the monopoly as nothing more than stinking blackmail from a stinking Government.
Mr. Lang:
The hon. Gentleman underlines the fact that the Post Office and the union have an interest in avoiding having the monopoly lifted, which can easily be achieved by the union calling off its industrial disputes--they will be far more damaging to the Post Office and to its staff in the longer term.
Mr. Jacques Arnold (Gravesham):
How long does my right hon. Friend think it will take for another U-turn to be performed by the Leader of the Opposition in opposing this strike and splattering his deputy back on that wall?
Mr. Lang:
My hon. Friend tempts me to stray into the private grief of the Labour party. I know that there are shadow Cabinet elections this week. I suspect that union sponsorship affects most of the Labour Members' attitudes in these matters.
Mrs. Gwyneth Dunwoody (Crewe and Nantwich):
As the Secretary of State has intervened in this industrial dispute, will he tell us whether it is now the attitude of Her Majesty's Government that, where workers have a ballot to decide their industrial action, they should be overridden by the particular interests of the Conservative party?
Mr. Lang:
The fact that the trade union had a ballot to embark on this series of industrial disputes--a ballot that happened as a result of legislation introduced by this Conservative Government, which has caused industrial relations to improve beyond recognition--does not prevent the union from calling off the strike now. It is to protect the public interest that we are urging the union to call off the strike.
Mr. David Lidington (Aylesbury):
Does my right hon. Friend agree that the real threat to the future of the Royal Mail comes from these strikes, which are costing the Royal Mail millions of pounds and threatening jobs--not merely among people employed by the postal service, but among those in companies that rely on a regular and punctual mail service for the future of their business?
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