Clause
65
Establishment
of Registrar General as corporation
sole
John
Healey:
We now turn to part 2 of the Bill, which deals
with questions concerning the Registrar General and future provisions
for the registration service, a matter that I am particularly pleased
we were able to cover.
As I said on Second Reading,
we are using the Bill as an opportunity to establish, finally, proper
employment rights for registration officers in England and Wales.
Currently, they are appointed and paid by a local authority, but can be
dismissed only by the Registrar General. They do not, therefore, enjoy
the rights and protections afforded to other staff, such as access to
an employment tribunal. That has for some time been a great concern for
my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton, South-East. The provisions in
this part of the Bill are in no small measure due directly to his
continuing efforts on the subject. He may well wish to add his own
comments on
that.
2
pm
Registration
officers provide a vital service that benefits all of us in the
community. Almost all of us will come into contact with the
registration service at some point in our lives—normally at the
most important moments in our lives and the lives of our families. It
is only right and proper that this group of workers is given for the
first time the rights and protections that are already available to
others.
Under the
Registration Service Act 1953, the Registrar General for England and
Wales is currently a statutory office holder, appointed by Her Majesty,
with functions set out in statute. That has been the position since the
post was created in 1836. The Registrar General has statutory functions
relating to the civil registration service, but also has other,
statistical, responsibilities such as conducting the census. Under the
Bill, the Registrar General’s current statistical functions will
become the responsibility of the statistics
board. The Registrar General will remain as head of the General Register
Office and will retain his or her responsibility for civil registration
in England and
Wales. Clause 65
modernises the position of the Registrar General, who is head of the
civil registration servicein England and Wales, by
establishing him as a corporation sole. I concede that that does not
sound very modern, but a corporation sole is an office occupied by one
person that has a separate legal identity from the office holder. Also,
the office continues to exist even if the office holder retires and is
replaced, or if there is a vacancy in the post. Currently, the rights
and liabilities of the Registrar General are personally held by the
office holder on behalf of the Crown. Establishing the Registrar
General as a corporation sole means that the rights and liabilities of
the office of Registrar General are separated from the office holder
and the rights and liabilities become the responsibility of the office,
rather than the office holder. That means that in the future the
Registrar General could enter into contracts in his or her own right
and such contracts would be the responsibility of the office, rather
than the office
holder.
Separating
the Registrar General from the National Statistician, and the General
Register Office from the Office for National Statistics, will reinforce
the ability of the Registrar General to operate independently, while
still allowing the General Register Office to be incorporated into a
wider structure if that is what is determined. I hope that the
Committee will accept that that flexibility is sensible and desirable,
given that the location of the General Register Office has still to be
finally determined. It has been considered as part of potential
machinery of government changes. On that basis, I hope that hon.
Members will agree that clause 65 should stand part of the
Bill.
Question put
and agreed
to.
Clause 65
ordered to stand part of the
Bill.
Clause
66
Employment
status of
officials
Question
proposed, That the clause stand part of the
Bill.
Dr.
Brian Iddon (Bolton, South-East) (Lab): It is strange how
one gets involved in business in this place. In the mid-1990s, I was a
director of the city challenge in Bolton and we were looking around for
flagship schemes. I proposed to the then leader of the council, Bob
Howarth, that we should bring back into use an old hall on a hill
overlooking Bolton that was in a rather attractive park. The hall had
been boarded up for several years. It had previously been a mill
owner’s house. I proposed that we move the registration service
in Bolton out of dreadful premises in the town centre—where the
brides came out into patches of oil on a taxi rank—to that
lovely old hall set in a beautiful park. That cost £1 million,
but it was achieved.
The registration service there
today supports a community centre, a hospitality suite with bars, and
so on. I was pleased to hear that it celebrated its 10th anniversary
last week and that Oliver Barton, who was the principal officer at the
time, returned and helped
them celebrate. I was pleased in one way, but not so pleased in another,
when my eldest daughter, Sally, chose to get married in Mere
hall—the lovely old hall that I am talking about—right in
the middle of the election campaign, which brought me to the House in
1997. When Joyce
Quin, the former hon. Member for Gateshead, East and Washington, West
was promoted to the other place as Baroness Quin, the Society of
Registration Officers was casting around for a new patron for England
and Wales. It was no surprise, therefore, when my name popped up. I was
initially pleased to be invited, because I thought that it was a great
honour, but it soon dawned on me that the society was giving me a huge
responsibility, because it was seeking to achieve what the Bill will,
hopefully, bring about. It has taken 10 years of campaigning. I have
lost count of how many Ministers I have met, both at the Department of
Trade and Industry and the Treasury, with officers of the Society of
Registration Officers and, latterly, Unison to try to bring about this
measure.
It is odd
that registration officers are appointed, housed and paid by local
authorities and that their pensions are arranged by local authorities,
but only one person—the Registrar General in Pimlico,
London—has the right to dismiss them. When I began this campaign
there was no right of appeal against dismissal. At least in the early
days of the campaign we won the right of appeal, but appeals had to be
heard by the Registrar General in Pimlico and he could hear them only
on the basis of new
evidence.
During my
time as the society’s patron at least 18 members of the service
have been dismissed—some of them under bitter circumstances that
I do not want to
relate.
2.8
pm
Sitting
suspended for a Division in the
House.
2.22
pm
On
resuming—
The
Chairman:
Dr. Iddon was just bringing his remarks to a
close.
Dr.
Iddon:
Mr. Olner, I will take the hint. I
thought that it was very considerate of the House authorities to sound
the wedding bells right in the middle of my speech.
[Laughter.]
What
clause 66 will do is transfer the employment of superintendent
registrars and their colleagues to the employment of local authorities,
which is what we have been campaigning for all this time. The Society
of Registration Officers—SORO—tells me that it has
historical records to suggest that this campaign has been going on for
60 years. I have documentary evidence to suggest that it started at
least in 1985 in the House when an efficiency scrutiny was published
which recommended this transfer of
employment.
Julia
Goldsworthy:
The hon. Gentleman has been very helpful in
explaining the genesis of the campaign, which has resulted in this
measure. As patron of the
Society of Registration Officers, can he tell us what proportion of
registration officers are members of the society and what other
consultation took place with registrars who were members of Unison or
other groups to ensure consultation across the whole
profession?
The
Chairman:
Order. The hon. Lady should not be tempting my
colleague into talking about something that is not actually in the
Bill.
Dr.
Iddon:
I will give a brief answer. I cannot give a
percentage, but I know that the figure is extremely high and that the
consultation has been going on for as long as I have been involved with
the campaign. There are one or two members of SORO who still recognise
that the status of being a statutory officer is rather special, but
frankly I think that it is an outdated status, and it causes problems.
What we are doing in clause 66 is the correct way
forward.
There is
another difficulty in the transfer in that statutory officers, as
registration officers are, do not have any official employer and
therefore on the whole do not come under employment legislation. This
area is a bit grey and rather complex, as the Library research paper
suggests. Under some of the employment legislation they could be
classed as workers, but there have not been many court cases to test
this. Myself, Unison and SORO have campaigned on two parallel tracks,
one of which has resulted in clause 66, and we have also campaigned
with the Department of Trade and Industry to bring in section 23 of the
Employment Act
2002.
This clause is
a better way forward, as the Library research paper suggests. To apply
section 23 would have left registration officers in that grey area and
there would have been some court cases before it was illustrated that
employment rights could be protected under the Employment
Act.
I thank the
Financial Secretary for taking on board what is essentially my
ten-minute Bill from the last Session of Parliament. He has listened,
and I am grateful for that, as are all the people concerned.
As I have mentioned, clause 66
and part 2 have the support of SORO and Unison. They also have the
support of the Local Authority Co-ordinators of Regulatory Services and
the employers’ organisation as well. One problem remains;
because registration officers have no legal employer, the Transfer of
Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations 1981 do not apply
to them. Therefore, I am very pleased that the Government have seen
their way to build into clause 66 protection of all the employment
rights of that group of workers. Incidentally, there are 1,700
registration officers—not a large number, but a significant one.
The clause protects the employment and pension rights of those people
when they are transferred. Their service will be seen as continuous, so
that their pension rights will transfer into the schemes of local
authorities, which in any case already organise their
pensions.
It would
be inappropriate of me not to thank Karen Knapton this afternoon. She
has worked with me for many years as the honorary secretary of the
Society of Registration Officers. She has now retired, and she
would have liked to have seen this campaign bear fruit today. I am now
continuing my work with Julie Hole, the present honorary secretary. I
thank those people. I will be able to go to the conference this spring
and give my 10th and valedictory speech—as Members know, I am
retiring. Instead of trying to find excuses for the Government, as I
have done at all my annual presentations in the past nine years, I will
be able to go out on a high note. Bearing in mind what you said at the
beginning of this part of the debate, Mr. Olner, I thank you
for your
patience.
Mrs.
Villiers:
I welcome the chance to say a few words
about the employment status of registration officers in England and
Wales. I would like to take this opportunity to pay tribute to the
important work undertaken by the hon. Member for Bolton, South-East on
the issue. As we have heard, he has been campaigning tirelessly for
many years and he deserves a huge amount of credit for the
measure.
The
Opposition welcome the changes. We would have been happy if the hon.
Gentleman’s private Member’s Bill had proceeded a few
years ago. That did not happen, thanks to the late great Eric Forth.
He, of course, had firm opinions about the use of private
Member’s Bill time for Government business. We are delighted to
see that the Government have used their own business time to propose
the measure to regularise the employment position of registrars and
superintendent registrars. It is clear that the law needs changing, and
I would like to join the Financial Secretary in paying tribute to the
work done by registrars at important and sometimes stressful ceremonies
in people’s family lives. They deal with the public with great
care and sensitivity. I would particularly like to single out the
registrars working in my constituency in Chipping Barnet for their
valuable work.
We
support the move to make registrars local authority employees and to
provide them with employment rights and protection. It seems not only
sensible but just and consistent to bring the employment of
registration officers into line with that of employees of local
authorities. I am sure that the change will be welcomed by
organisations that have long campaigned for it, such as SORO, Unison
and the other organisations to which the hon. Gentleman
referred.
2.30
pm
There is one
point on which I seek reassurancefrom the Minister. I have
received a representation from one registration officer who is unhappy
with the Government’s proposals. She fears that the changes
could remove one of the safeguards relating to the registration of
deaths. Registration officers decide whether to refer a death to the
coroner. The registrar in question is concerned that if registration
officers and coroners become local authority employees, that will in
some way interfere with the freedom of registrars to take a decision in
the public interest. Since I have not heard from any other registrars
on the point, it is reasonable to conclude that that is a minority
concern, but because it has been raised with me it would be useful to
hear the Financial Secretary’s view. Is he confident that the
Bill will ensure that sufficient
safeguards are still in place on the registration of deaths? Have such
concerns been brought to his
attention? According
to the Association of Registration and Celebratory Services, some
concern has been expressed that registrars would suffer a loss of
independenceif they became local authority employees. My
understanding is that such concerns seem largely to have been laid to
rest and that the reform is broadly welcomed not just by members on
both sides of the Committee but by a significant majority of
registration officers. We welcome the proposals and would be grateful
for clarification on the points that I have
mentioned.
Rob
Marris:
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for
Bolton, South-East, on the wonderful work that he has done on this
matter. Will the Financial Secretary clarify one point? Clause 66(8)
defines a local authority. Will a unitary authority such as
Wolverhampton, where my constituency is located, come under the rubric
of paragraph (b), which includes in that
definition
“a district
council in England for an area without a county
council”?
Wolverhampton
city council is not commonly described as a district council, and a
number of other authorities are in the same
position.
Julia
Goldsworthy:
I join everyone else in welcoming the
proposals and congratulating the hon. Member for Bolton, South-East on
his work in bringing them forward. It makes sense to deal with this
matter at the same time as changes to the statistics
system.
I wish to
raise one issue—the possibility of a registration officer
simultaneously holding theposition of deputy registration
officer. I have had correspondence, I suspect from the same person as
the hon. Member for Chipping Barnet. I believe that this person holds
the post of registration officer and is also deputy officer. Deputy
superintendent registrars and deputy registrars are already local
authority employees, so what impact will the clause have on people who
hold deputy as well as main registrar posts? That relates to
subsections (2)(c) and (d), which may well be clarified in subsections
(5)(a) and (b), but it is worth putting the matter on
record.
John
Healey:
I shall first respond to the substantive
contribution made by my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton, South-East.
He gave an eloquent and rather moving account of his work and what has
motivated it over the years. The progress that can be made through
private Member’s legislation and the dividends that can come
from persistent pressure are a testament to the role of Members of the
House. His work on the matter is in the best traditions of the House
and the role of Members of
Parliament.
The
clause will give about 1,700 registration officers status as local
government employees. For the first time, they will have access to the
tribunals, rights and protections that others have had for some time.
My hon. Friend is right. I made sure that clause 66 ensured that
registration officers’ existing terms and conditions were
retained after the formal transfer of employment
status. Not least as a result of his work, the proposals command the
support of all bodies in this rather densely-populated field of local
government organisations. I listened to him carefully, but am not sure
whether he mentioned that Unison was strongly supportive of his Bill
and his campaign to secure this new status for registration officers.
When he goes to the annual conference of the Society of Registration
Officers later this year, he can give it the good news and, I hope,
convey the Government’s and the Committee’s good wishes.
The society provides a vital service and the change in the clause is
long overdue. The
concerns raised by the hon. Member for Chipping Barnet have not been
brought to my attention before. The registration officer who contacted
her was concerned that registration officers’ important
discretion to refer a death to the coroner for further examination
would be affected. I see nothing in the legislation or the intention
behind it to suggest that that would be the case. However, I shall
double check and if I am wrong, shall let the hon. Lady and other
Committee members
know.
In response to
my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-West, I should say
that the provisions in clause 66 include a comprehensive list of all
local authorities with registration functions. I think, therefore, that
his concerns are covered. In answer to the hon. Member for Falmouth and
Camborne, deputies, like registration officers, will indeed become
local authority employees. In light of our debate, I hope that both
sides of the Committee will give a good loud shout in support of the
clause.
Question
put and agreed
to.
Clause 66
ordered to stand part of the
Bill.
Clauses
67 to 70 ordered to stand part of the
Bill.
Schedule
4 agreed
to.
Clauses 71
to 73 agreed
to.
John
Healey:
On a point of order, Mr. Olner. May I
pay tribute to you and your co-Chairman, Sir John? You have chaired our
Committee flexibly and firmly and have helped to guide us in giving due
scrutiny to all the provisions in the Bill. I am particularly grateful
to the Clerks for the advice that they have given to you,
Mr. Olner, to us and to the officials. I pay tribute to the
Official Reporters; some of the technical points that I have made might
have been a bit obscure and hard to follow—as I daresay some of
my arguments have been—but they have done a marvellous job. The
same is true of the police and the staff of the House, who have ensured
the smooth running of our proceedings during the past two
weeks.
I also pay
tribute to the Opposition Front-Bench spokespeople: the hon. Members
for Chipping Barnet, for Fareham, for Twickenham and for Falmouth and
Camborne. I also thank the hon. Member for Dundee, East, who represents
both his Front Bench and his Back Bench in the Committee. Minority
parties do not always take their place in legislative Committees. He is
not in his place this afternoon, but he is particularly assiduous in
carrying out the duties for his party on the Treasury brief, and I
welcome his interest in serving on the Committee, not least because of
Scotland’s decision
to be a full part of the Bill, which is equally strongly supported by my
hon. Friend the Member for Central Ayrshire, who is in his place this
afternoon. I am also
grateful to all Back-Bench Members of the Committee. They might not
make the Minister’s job easier, but I welcome the contributions
from both sides of the Room to the scrutiny of legislation in
Committee. At the profound risk of singling some out but not
others—it is like judging a beautiful baby competition—I
must say that the hon. Member for Sevenoaks has brought to our
proceedings his usual forensic examination of the Bill. He chaired the
Treasury Committee’s inquiry, has spoken widely at conferences
and to interest groups, and is therefore highly knowledgeable on the
subject.
I must also
mention my right hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, South and Penarth.
He has brought to our deliberations the passion that he showed in
government for the people responsible for policy and public services
locally. He has been clear in insisting that we use the new statistical
system to recognise their role and to help them play it
better.
My hon.
Friend the Member for Bolton, South-East has worked for so long and
pursued so many paths—and Ministers—to put the employment
of registration officers on a proper footing. I am pleased to be the
Minister who is finally able to do so, not least because it will save
so many of my colleagues from his assiduous attention. My hon. Friend
the Member for Portsmouth, North, has played a necessarily low-key role
in the Committee’s proceedings, but one that is vital and
appreciated by any Minister.
My hon. Friend the Member for
Wolverhampton, South-West has contributed with his usual attention to
detail, both of the Bill and of debates, and is a lesson to us all in
providing active Back-Bench scrutiny of legislation. This is the first
such Committee on which he and I have served together in which he has
not mentioned the explanatory notes accompanying the Bill, except when
I mentioned them first. If he wants to correct me, I will check the
official record to see whether I have made a mistake—on second
thoughts, I will not, but I guess that he
might.
2.45
pm
Mr.
Newmark:
Will the Financial Secretary giveway? Is
it the first time that the hon. Gentleman has supported the
Government?
John
Healey:
We are looking at a first for the Bill in other
ways. The hon. Member for Twickenham declared himself “quite
overwhelmed” by how, for the first time in 10 years, he has
tabled an amendment that has been accepted. Once again, I am delighted
to be in a position to make the hon. Gentleman so happy.
My hon. Friend the Member for
Slough helped to establish a new parliamentary protocol on the
acceptable use of a word as a noun rather than an adjective for the
contents of the sewers of Slough. The hon. Member for South-West
Hertfordshire broke new ground too, when he proposed incorporating two
minutes on the naughty step as a sanction for board members. I have
persuaded parliamentary counsel to
have another look at the concept of misbehaviour, but they regarded that
as a step too far. [
Laughter.
] I am glad that the
members of the Committee are still awake after our long
proceedings—that was a little test for my hon. Friend the Member
for Loughborough. On
a slightly more serious note, we have a parliamentary first for the
Committee—ours is the first Bill under the new Public Bill
process, by which we have resolved to take in and publish written
evidence. I am slightly disappointed that no written evidence has been
submitted for us to publish, but I guess that it is early days for the
new system.
The Clerk
described this part of our proceedings as Oscar-winning stuff. In that
vein, I wish to point out that I have refrained from mentioning my
mother-in-law or, indeed, Mrs. Gauke. Finally, the hon.
Member for Bexleyheath and Crayford and the Lord Commissioner of Her
Majesty's Treasury, my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, West have
done an excellent job of keeping us on track, in making sure that we
have given due scrutiny to the Bill but in an efficient way. I have
particularly valued the advice of my hon. Friend the Member for
Cardiff, West. In my own small way, I have returned that favour by
dropping him a note to ensure that he knows exactly which way to vote
on
Report.
Mrs.
Villiers:
Further to that point of order, Mr.
Olner. I should like to join the Financial Secretary in thanking you
for your excellent stewardship of the Committee and in putting on
record our thanks to your co-Chairman, Sir John. I should like to
thank, in his absence, my hon. Friend the Member for Fareham for
handling the Bill from the Front Bench for me, as well as the team
behind me: my hon. Friends the Members for Braintree and for South-West
Hertfordshire. I am delighted that Mrs. Gauke’s name
is finally on the record; I was going to ensure that it happened, but
the Financial Secretary got there
first.
I particularly
welcome and agree warmly with the tributes paid by the Financial
Secretary to my hon. Friend the Member for Sevenoaks, who has brought
rigorous scrutiny and huge expertise to the Committee’s
deliberations. He has played an extremely strong part in the scrutiny
process. I should like to thank the hon. Member for Wolverhampton,
South-West for his usual forensic scrutiny, not only of the
Opposition’s activities but of the
Government’s.
Turning to the Financial
Secretary, much of what he has told us in Committee has provided
welcome clarification. As he will be aware, there are a number of
points on which we will continue our campaign to
strengthen the Bill, but we have been able to clarify some points in an
important way. I,
too, welcome the contribution of the hon. Member for Dundee, East and
was struck by the comments of the hon. Member for Twickenham and his
moving address to the Committee after his amendment was accepted. I
recall that I had about 30 amendments accepted to the Finance Bill last
summer, but it takes a while for such things to happen.
I should also like to place on
record my thanks to the Clerks of the Committee, who have done an
excellent job, to the Hansard writers, the police and the staff
and to the unmentionable—the Whips—who have done an
excellent job in managing the business of the
Committee.
Julia
Goldsworthy:
Further to that point of order,
Mr. Olner. On behalf of my hon. Friend the Member for
Twickenham and myself, I thank you for your support and for ensuring
both that we got through the Bill in a timely way and that sufficient
scrutiny was undertaken. At times, debates on some groups of amendments
became complicated, and we appreciate your guidance, which was
essential in ensuring that we kept in order. We also appreciate the
effort that the Clerks made to keep up with our ramblings. I also thank
the Official Reporters for their help, and I thank the police and staff
of the House for making sure that everything proceeded
smoothly.
If it were
a beautiful baby competition, everyone would have gone home with a
prize for their contributions. We have had some interesting debates and
we have covered a wide range of issues in the past couple of weeks. The
Financial Secretary has been helpful and productive in dealing with the
matters that Liberal Democrat Members have raised. That may be why my
hon. Friend the hon. Member for Twickenham was so moved; it sounds as
though he gave something akin to an Oscar acceptance speech. I am sure
that he treasures his amendment being agreed to more than he would
treasure an Oscar.
I
thank the hon. Members for Chipping Barnet and for Fareham for being so
co-operative. This has been a fairly smooth Committee. We have
discussed some serious matters, but they have all been dealt with well.
These proceedings have led to a first for my hon. Friend and a first
for the Committee in terms of the submission of written evidence, and I
hope that both precedents will be followed by many more
successes.
Bill,
as amended, to be
reported.
Committee
rose at eight minutes to Three
o’clock.
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