George Freeman calls on Government to listen to small businesses when considering employment law reform
21st May 2012
Following the Minister’s statement on the Beecroft report into employment reform, George Freeman calls on the Government to listen to small businesses who are struggling with big-company legislation and remember that it is micro-businesses that are the key to the growth.
George Freeman (Mid Norfolk) (Con): Does the Minister agree that, when the Government have decided how to respond to the report, it will be important to listen more to the small businessmen and women around the country than to those on the Labour Front Bench—I do not think that any of them have started a business—and to remember that micro-businesses are the key to the growth that we all want to see? Does he acknowledge that too many of our small companies are struggling with big-company legislation, and that well intentioned employment legislation often has the opposite effect, in that it puts employers off taking the risk of employing people and creates a licence for spurious claims at employment appeals tribunals?
Mr Prisk: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. We saw an unreformed employment tribunal system that—as my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, who used to be an employment Minister, knows all too well—had failed under the last Government. This Government changed it, and that is a record we can be proud of.
