The Government expects its new anti-strike legislation, which will have its first reading in the House of Commons today, to be challenged in the courts, Grant Shapps has suggested.
Asked whether the strikes (minimum service levels) bill could be delayed because of legal challenges from unions, the business secretary told Times Radio: “Well, here is the secret, almost all legislation is at some point challenged in court, that is how it is tested but Parliament is able to make primary legislation, that is the job of Parliament to do, should it so desire.
“All we would be doing here is bringing ourselves into line with what is already practised in many other countries”.
The decision to bring forward the legislation, designed to impose minimum service level requirements in six key public services comes after crisis talks on Monday between ministers and unions failed to resolve ongoing disputes with nurses, teachers and rail workers.
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Commenting on the talks, Mr Shapps insisted that the Government is “bending over backwards” to stop the nation’s “forever strikes”.
He said: “Now, quite what is then discussed in these talks going forward, we will have to wait and see, I am not privy to that, I am not in the room.
“But I do think it is important that everyone knows we want to bring these strikes, which in some cases with the railways for example seem to have turned into sort of forever strikes, we want to bring this to a close and the Government is bending over backwards to do that”.
He later told GB News: “common sense tells us that we need to have minimum safety levels”.
The health secretary, Steve Barclay, is reportedly considering backdating next year’s NHS staff pay increase, as well as making a one-off cost-of-living payment.
Labour’s shadow work and pensions secretary Jonathan Ashworth said the new anti-strike laws are “unworkable” and warned against sacking striking NHS staff.
He told Sky News: “I think this legislation is unworkable. The Government are effectively saying to a nurse, a paramedic, a healthcare assistant, that if you exercise your right to industrial action, if you exercise your right to withdraw your labour because your pay is inadequate then they are going to sack you, they are going to sack a nurse”.
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