Lucy Burton, the Employment Editor of the Telegraph, has a good piece in the paper today about how flat-out crazy the Government’s plan is to ban banter in pubs, bars and restaurants, with the head of the CBI describing them as “completely unnecessary”. Some colleagues and I in the Lords will be proposing various amendments to the Employment Rights Bill in the Lords later today in an effort to scrap the ‘banter ban’, but the Government will fight them tooth and nail. Here’s how Lucy’s piece begins:
Rupert Soames, the outspoken CBI chief, hit the nail on the head last week when he told a union chief that businesses are often confronted with what he calls the “doctor problem”.
Doctors, he explained, spend the majority of their time with just 5pc of people who are ill. Like GPs, the HR headaches employers face typically stem from a tiny fraction of staff.
His point was that parts of the looming Employment Rights Bill, which will strengthen rights for workers and trade unions, are completely unnecessary. “You don’t go and lock all 100 chickens in a coop, for the fear that one is going to go wrong,” he argued, mixing his metaphors somewhat.
A key example of the overreach of the new bill is its so-called “pub banter” ban provision, which will force venues such as pubs and universities to do all they can to protect employees from non-sexual third-party harassment. In a nutshell, it means pub and restaurant bosses could find themselves policing customer conversations and any jokes that staff might find offensive.
The Equality and Human Rights Commission has already warned that the proposed rules are too broad-brush and could lead to “excessive limitations on debate”. But perhaps more importantly, there isn’t actually much evidence that this is even an issue. The ban seems to be fixing a made-up problem.
Free speech campaigner Lord Young will make this point at a Lords hearing on Monday, as the Bill continues to chug through the parliamentary process.
He will pull out a survey from last year that shows that just 0.5pc of respondents reported experiencing non-sexual third-party harassment at work in the year to March.
Policing something that appears to be a problem for just 0.5pc of workers could prove detrimental to already-stretched small businesses such as family-owned pubs and restaurants, which work in boisterous environments and don’t have hordes of HR and legal staff to support them.
Lord Young will argue in the House of Lords today that such a rule could also have a much broader impact on culture, with football stadiums becoming like libraries and “‘banter bouncers’ in every beer garden”.
Introducing red-tape to solve non-issues doesn’t feel like a driver of economic growth, either. Why are we chewing over this “Alice in Wonderland” clause, as one peer called it earlier this year, when there is so much more important stuff going on in the world?
Worth reading in full.
Stop Press: Lucy Burton has another piece in today’s Telegraph, this one about another amendment that Claire Fox and I are proposing to the Employment Rights Bill – hoping to speak to that one later today, too – which would amend the Equality Act so it protects all political opinions and affiliations, provided they meet a fairly broad test, not just left-of-centre political views, which is the position at the moment. This amendment would make it unlawful for employers not to employ someone – or to sack someone – because of their lawful political beliefs. At the moment, some political beliefs enjoy ‘protected’ status under the Act, meaning you cannot be discriminated against for possessing them, while others don’t – and which are and which aren’t protected is entirely predictable. For instance, a belief in anti-Zionism is protected, but a belief in Zionism isn’t. A belief in Scottish independence is, a belief in unionism isn’t. A belief in democratic socialism is, a belief in conservatism isn’t. My amendment would level the playing field.
Lord Young of Acton is to table a new amendment to Ms Rayner’s Employment Rights Bill addressing what he claimed was “a ‘two tier’ system in which, broadly speaking, Left-of-centre beliefs are protected by the Equality Act and Right-of-centre beliefs aren’t.”
The amendment will ban companies from punishing staff for discussing controversial political views at work, so long as they are legal.
The Free Speech Union, Lord Young’s campaign group, is currently aware of six cases involving Reform UK activists who have lost jobs because of their political views. Lord Young said there was “little rhyme or reason” as to which beliefs enjoy protected status and which do not.
Lord Young said: “For instance, anti-Zionism is a protected belief, but Zionism isn’t. A belief in Democratic Socialism is protected, but a belief in Conservatism isn’t.”
Worth reading in full.
Stop Press 2: Use the Free Speech Union’s template to email a peer about why they should oppose the ‘banter ban’. It only takes two minutes to fill out. Link here.
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Insane? Only in so far as Socialist Fascism, Authoritarianism, Collectivism, Tyranny, Control Freakery, Communism, Marxism, call it what you want but it boils down to wanting to tell people what to do and micromanage everything, the lust for power, are “insane”.
Well, they are.
The object of power is power
I know people who lived under the socialist tyranny in Czechoslovakia and I can tell you that this kind of government overreach leads to very very unpleasant outcomes. People scared to express views in case an activist reports them to the StB, or someone who steps out of line and is then spied on and imprisoned for saying something construed to be illegal.
There are very dark times ahead!
Yes. Psychopathic.
It is a surprise that only 0.5pc of respondents reported being subjected to third party harassment at work, given that a far higher proportion of people than that will just lie if it suits their interests.
Well as I more or less said above, these kinds of laws are not for the 0.5%, the laws are to take those who step out of line out of circulation. It’s already happened under the monsters in power at the moment. Expect bad things to happen, the only problem is talking about it when it the bad things do happen.
what with this and the EU betrayal occurring before our very eyes it’s clear that this government have the smell of fascists.
Like the rest of modern politics, the banter ban reveals far more about the imposers than the imposed upon – micro-managerialist wonks divorced from reality.
Here’s to the 2020’s going the way of the 1650’s and the demise of the roundheads ushering in an overdue decade of eat, drink and be merry.
There is a great deal of “rhyme or reason” as to which beliefs enjoy protected status and which do not. The left protecttheir own people and the views of the elites whereas the 14 years of Conservative governments did not, apparently, include opportunities to level the playing field.
Why? Because those governments did not believe that views not in accordance with elite guidance should be permitted.
That amendment by Lord Toby and Claire Fox is fantastic news, and Lord Young’s contributions to the debate show the real worth of the House of Lords, in stopping and ameliorating the worst excesses of the House of Commons.
TY has the bit between his teeth and has certainly enbraced the opportunity afforded him by his “elevation”. Anyone who though he was just after some kudos was mistaken.
Agreed. Toby does what he does for all the right reasons. No kudos sought, no desire to signal virtue. Crack on, Lord Young.
It will be impossible to police, very difficult to prosecute (he said/she said, no I didn’t, yes you did…) , and jury-nullification will ensure there are very few, if any, convictions in the event of prosecution.
Shades of the MontyPython “Argument” sketch. I once halted some back seat squabbling by asking “is this the right room for an argument?” which was viewed as intriguing and shut them up as I had to explain what I was on about. The real thing will not be as amusing though.
Not at all. There will be presumption in favour of the offended party. It will be up to the offender to prove they did not caused offence, which will be impossible because the offended person will always have the upper hand
Did you read the bit about jury nullification? I’ll explain. When a jury considers legislation is shite, or unfairly applied in a particular case, although they understand that technically the deaf-end-ant is guilty, the jury returns not guilty. This is called jury nullification or jury equity or perverse verdict. The powers that be don’t like it but can’t stop it. This is why from time to time there is a murmur about doing away with jury trials.
When this happens enough times, the prosecution stops recommending cases go to Court, the police lose interest.
The reason why Lucy Connolly was persuaded to plead guilty was had she pleaded not guilty it is very likely the goons in charge would not have bothered with a Court case knowing the jury would have found not guilty.
Wrote to my Plaid Cymru MP about this some months ago.In her reply she said she was all for the ban as it protects workers, I expected nothing else. She’s an authoritarian, pro mass immigration, Marxist that makes Two Tier look like a far right extremist.
Email sent.
When policies are absurd then you need to silence all criticism of them, and that is basically what this shutting everyone up is all about.
Take the banter out of the Great British Pub and what’s left? Essentially they’re proposing to abolish the whole reason most people go to pubs in the first place. I can imagine a poster displaying the rules and regulations concerning accepted topics of conversation…
“Please be aware that the management of this establishment will only accept sorrowful stories and bland but polite discourse, and reserves the right to remove from the premise and impose a permanent ban on anyone who dares to elevate the sombre tone by engaging in the crime of “Banter”.
“Laughter is allowed, but only up to a certain decibel level, and we politely request that customers emit no sound in excess of a polite chuckle.”
“Jokes, contrarian opinions and any rhetoric criticizing the current government’s policies on gender ideology is strictly prohibited”.
“Under no circumstances will we tolerate any attempt to amuse by engaging in heretical talk, such as mocking the Great and Powerful Ed Milliband or blaspheming against the religion of Net Zero.”
“Any mimicry, silly impressions or toilet humour will result in permanent eviction of the perpetrator”.
Believe me, I could go on!