In the next session of the Scottish Parliament, tackling work injustice and delivering Fair Work should be urgent priorities, writes Katy Clark, Scottish Labour candidate for Cunninghame South.
For too many workers across Scotland, fair work is little more than a slogan. Their reality is an economy which doesn’t serve their interests. The SNP Scottish Government spoke of Scotland being a fair work nation by 2025, but work injustice and in-work poverty remain significant problems across the country. Up to six in ten of those living in poverty are in households where someone works. Low pay, insecure work, poor terms and conditions, and a lack of union recognition are still all too common in many sectors.
Around 12% of workers are still paid less than the Real Living Wage. Over 100,000 workers in Scotland are believed to still be on exploitative zero-hours contracts. Sectors like social care, renewable energy, and hospitality are rife with poor terms and conditions, from unpaid overtime to a lack of reimbursement for travel and uniforms.
Union recognition and membership remain heavily concentrated in the public sector, in large part due to restrictive anti-union laws passed by successive Conservative governments. Thanks to tireless campaigning by trade unionists and the broader labour movement, the Labour Party committed itself while in opposition to the New Deal for Working People, which represented the largest potential expansion of workers’ rights in a generation, promising the roll-back of years of anti-union and anti-worker measures.
We should recognise that Labour has begun to deliver on the New Deal for Working People through the Employment Rights Act. Workers will have access to sick pay and maternity leave from the first day on the job. The anti-union laws passed by the last Conservative government have been repealed. Trade union reps will have greater protections in workplaces, and balloting will be modernised through the introduction of electronic voting. Redundancy pay has been improved, and the caps on unfair dismissal compensation have been abolished. Workers will have the right to reasonable notice of a shift, any changes to a shift, or a cancellation of a shift. Workers who find their jobs outsourced will no longer see their terms and conditions eroded as a result.
These changes will have a real and lasting impact for workers across Scotland, and will I hope begin to help address the problem of work injustice. However, we have to recognise that the Employment Rights Act has not delivered on all of the New Deal for Working People. That is why the next Scottish Government, irrespective of party, must work alongside trade unions and the broader labour movement to make sure that future UK Government legislation delivers on initiatives like the outlawing of fire and rehire practices and a ban on zero-hours contracts.
It would however be wrong to suggest that, simply because employment law remains reversed to Westminster, the Scottish Government has no role in tackling work injustice.
While the Employment Rights Act and delivering on the New Deal for Working People in full are steps for the UK Government to take, Scotland has significant devolved powers at its disposal which are currently not being used to their full potential. The SNP set out the Fair Work agenda over a decade ago, yet we see near daily reminders that this agenda has largely been unsuccessful in many sectors of Scotland’s economy.
Many higher education institutions continue not to engage in meaningful consultation with trade unions, while threatening job cuts. Workers in the hospitality sector continue to face a range of issues from workplace harassment to lack of safe transport home. Progress on delivering sectoral collective bargaining in the social care sector remains stubbornly slow.
In the next session of the Scottish Parliament, we must make tackling work injustice and truly delivering on the Fair Work agenda an urgent priority. That means delivering collective bargaining in the social care sector and expanding it to other sectors as well. In the public transport sector, the assault of workers should be made a specific offence and treated as aggravated assault, recognising the unacceptability of violence against workers. Women workers in all sectors, including teachers and classroom assistants, are facing an increase in violence, sexism and misogyny, and far more action is needed to tackle this.
Continued receipt of Scottish Government grants and public funding should be conditional not just on agreement with Fair Work principles, but actual regular evidence that these are being adhered to. Commissioning and procurement processes should give greater weighting to Fair Work principles, particularly union recognition, and should also include additional conditions like paying the Real Living Wage or collectively bargained rates, and abiding by national agreements like that covering engineering construction. Fair Work principles should also be updated to include greater focus on improving the rights of young, women, ethnic minority and disabled workers, and to promote flexible working practices.
If re-elected to the Scottish Parliament, I will continue to work with trade unions and the broader labour movement to make the case for such action to tackle work injustice across Scotland.
Katy Clark has served as a Labour MSP for West Scotland since 2021. She is Scottish Labour’s Spokesperson for Community Safety. She was previously the MP for North Ayrshire and Arran from 2005 to 2015.
