Section Menu

Union Equality Representatives Conference

The Rt. Hon. John Hutton MP,  Secretary of State for Business, Enterprise & Regulatory Reform
Church House, Westminster, London,  24 June 2008

Many thanks for your invitation to speak today, and the opportunity to pay tribute to the work you are doing, day in day out, within our workplaces.

Work to ensure that all of our employees can make the most of the opportunities from a fulfilling working life. At the same time as helping to ensure we have productive workplaces and a competitive economy - because these two things are indispensable.

I would like to say today why I believe your work within our changing workplaces, and with the most diverse workforce ever, is key to securing success at work in the future.

And explain what the Government can do to support the role that you fulfil. In particular to create the conditions where there is a strong and positive dialogue between employees and employers – to the mutual benefit of working people and the companies they work for.

Since 1997 we have three million more people in work. We have more people in employment today than at any time in our history. The biggest rise in employment has been amongst the groups that started off in the worst position – older workers, lone parents and disabled people.

This hasn’t happened by accident. Our welfare to work reforms have given greater opportunities for all working age people to get into work, combined with the stability secured in the economy over the past decade.

We now have almost eight million over the age of 50 working in Britain today; more long term sick and disabled people are finding work, and ethnic minorities now make up almost 15% of the total workforce in our country.

We also have around 1.5 million more women in work since 1997, and the New Deal, much criticised by our political opponents, has helped more than half a million lone parents into work.

This diverse workforce has been central to strengthening our economy – bringing new skills, expertise and importantly, a drive to succeed.

The joint report from CBI and TUC earlier this month confirmed the value to the economy and society of workplace diversity. The report found that it led to workplaces that enjoyed higher productivity and better staff retention. In other words, the economic case for diversity is now beyond doubt.

But we cannot let our foot off the pedal. Our increasingly competitive global economy is bringing a constant demand for new skills, the need to be adaptable and flexible, and where realistically someone will change jobs several times in their working life.

Within these changing workplaces, union representatives, and equality reps in particular, make a very positive contribution.

Advising on a range of issues that affect our diverse workforce, whether on work/life balance, disabled access issues, or action to fight discrimination - to name just a few. You can make a positive difference.

So the Government is determined to support your role and enable you to secure greater equality for your workers.

Firstly, through our support from the Union Modernisation Fund, where my Department has already provided just over £1.5 million for fifteen equality reps projects, working across the private and public sectors.

I hope these projects are making a real difference in the workplace by promoting equality awareness, information sharing and training.

I know from my own experience many years ago that being a union representative is not an easy task, certainly in an area dealing with equality issues, where there might not be the developed training and information that many people would like to see. So I hope the UMF funding is helping you with these important roles, helping you to develop a sense of how all of this can be done.

Secondly, by doing more for vulnerable workers so that they know how they can take advantage of their strengthened rights at work. To help them speak out against abuse.

As the TUC’s Commission on Vulnerable Employment has so powerfully demonstrated, there are huge injustices still out there that we all need to tackle.

Thirdly, we will only achieve equality in the workplace if we help parents and carers balance their work and family lives. So they don’t have to make a choice between one or the other, but rather can gain fulfilment from both.

The right to request flexible working is important in this area too – six million people currently have the right. After the Imelda Walsh Review, so will another 4.5 million parents of older children too.

I hope you will be able to play an active part also in our forthcoming campaign to raise awareness of flexible working rights for both employees and businesses which will begin in the next few weeks. Because by seeking to make more fathers in particular aware of their right to request flexible working, we can make families aware that they have more options than just leaving childcare responsibilities up to the mother alone.

Finally, the Government’s Equalities Bill which is going to be published shortly will contain important measures to further advance equality in the workplace.

You are showing today that you can achieve a great deal when employers are willing partners in tackling inequality.

The Government considers, as you know, that our priority should be to continue to find new ways to encourage dialogue between employers and employees to help gain consensus on these workplace related issues.

In this way we will create high performing workplaces in the future, while maintaining UK competitiveness. And most importantly, ensuring that more and more people are able to work.

I have always seen union representatives as a key agent of change. The modern representative can help deliver the modern workplace of the future. There is a lot of innovation in the union world, too much of which goes unnoticed and unpublicised.

That is why we have invited the TUC and the CBI to sit down with us and draft a joint statement promoting the achievements of the modern union representative. We began that work this spring and we hope to publish the joint statement around the end of the year, drawing on the real-life experiences of union representatives. I hope and expect that the joint statement will showcase the work of equality representatives, presenting case studies illustrating the practical effect of your work.

We must act so that as many of our people as possible can prosper through change and uncertainty, ready and equipped to use their talents and fulfil their ambitions whatever the challenges and opportunities ahead.

So I know that there are still a great deal of issues for us to debate and discuss. I hope we can work together on this common agenda.

I want to thank and congratulate you all for all the important work you are doing promoting fairness and opportunities within our workplaces.

Thank you very much.