Justin Madders MP: speeches

Speeches

• 23 Apr 2026 · Public Procurement · Hansard source

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  Last week, I had the pleasure of visiting the Royal Mail depot in Ellesmere Port, where I went in one of its newly purchased vans from the Stellantis factory just down the road—a perfect example of how we should be supporting British industry. I urge the Minister to look further at this issue, because what he has announced is a start, but it does not go far enough. We need to make sure that every school, hospital, council, utility and big provider of services in this country is looking at how it can buy British and support our great manufacturing sector.

• 25 Feb 2026 · Student Loan Repayment Plans · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Ms Lewell. I declare an interest: I have three sons who have huge debts from their time in education. I would be surprised if more than one of them pays off their debt in full, but that would be in line with the roughly one third of all students who fully repay their loans. Does that not tell us on its own that the system is not working? Would any bank be in business if only one third of its customers repaid their loans? We have a system of loans that most people will not be able to repay. Should that not tell us something about the balance not being right? I want to make a broader point about how we can also improve the system for the benefit of the whole country. We should consider whether those who serve our public services should have their loans repaid by the state while they continue in the service of it. After all, if the justification for repayment of loans is that the individual has benefited financially from their university education, should there not also be an argument that if the state is benefiting from that individual’s education by the service they provide, the state should also bear some responsibility for the repayment? I appreciate that that would be a significant rewiring of the system, but I have no doubt that it would help with recruitment and retention, particularly in the NHS. It may even stem the tide of doctors and nurses leaving these shores to work elsewhere, and it would be a way for us to say, “As a thank you for your public service, we will help repay the loans.” Of course, as we have heard, the immediate challenge is to end the retrospective moving of the goalposts and the punitive interest rates for people who, do not forget, are trying to save for a home, start a family or even save for retirement. Under this system, that is impossible.

• 23 Feb 2026 · Schools White Paper: Every Child Achieving and Thriving · Hansard source

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  First, I declare an interest: my wife is a teacher. In her statement, the Secretary of State spoke about her desire for schools to be welcoming environments for children. That really matters because when a school implies that it might not be the right setting for a child, it can often be the start of multiple battles with the council, other schools and the NHS, and every stage of that is a rejection for the child. How can we ensure that when we fix the system, we fix the culture as well?

• 5 Nov 2025 · Employment Rights Bill · Hansard source

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  I am grateful to the shadow Secretary of State for giving way. I am pleased that he has learned to count now; he must have improved his skills since his time under Liz Truss in the Treasury. He talked about the consensus over 30 years, but was it not his Government who introduced the Trade Union Act 2016, which did so much to damage trade union relations?

• 15 Sept 2025 · Employment Rights Bill · Hansard source

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  I draw attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests, which includes an election donation from the Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers and my membership of the Unite and GMB unions. I welcome the Bill’s return to the House and the opportunity to consider the amendments made in the other place. I also welcome the new Secretary of State to his place and thank him for his kind words. I also welcome the Under-Secretary of State for Business and Trade, my hon. Friend the Member for Halifax (Kate Dearden), to her ministerial position—undoubtedly the best job in Government—and wish her every success in that role. I know that she will be a champion for workers and that she will be committed to introducing the “make work pay” agenda in full, as we promised in our manifesto. I am speaking a few rows back from where I had expected to be today. The shadow Secretary of State mentioned getting a short-notice cancellation payment—I am afraid that has not winged its way to me yet. However, I am delighted to be speaking in any capacity, because this Bill really is what a Labour Government should be delivering on. I was able, alongside my right hon. Friends the Members for Ashton-under-Lyne (Angela Rayner) and for Stalybridge and Hyde (Jonathan Reynolds), to take the new deal for working people—a policy programme carefully developed in opposition—and turn it into legislation that was laid before the House within 100 days of taking office, as we promised we would. While I started my ministerial role as I ended it—fired with enthusiasm—my hopes for the meaningful change that the Bill can deliver remain undimmed. That we are here entering the Bill’s final stages is testament to the hard work and dedication of those who developed the policy programme both in opposition and in government. I place on record my thanks to those in the Department for Business and Trade who helped shape those manifesto commitments into the Bill. I also pay tribute to Baroness Jones of Whitchurch, who did a sterling job of guiding the legislation through the other place amid intense scrutiny and opposition, which of course we will talk about. I will not go through every Lords amendment; I will just pick out a few of those I consider to be most damaging and undermining of the intentions that we set out in our manifesto about how we will rebalance the workplace to make it work for ordinary people. First, Lords amendment 1 completely undermines the principle, set out in our manifesto, of banning exploitative zero-hours contracts. The amendment would water down the commitment we gave to provide workers with an offer of a guaranteed-hours contract to a right to request guaranteed hours. There has long been a misunderstanding—perhaps a wilful misunderstanding—of how the policy operates. It does not prevent those who want to remain on zero-hours contracts from continuing to do so, and neither does it prevent employers from hiring seasonal workers. It simply provides the opportunity for those who want certainty about the hours they work, week to week and month to month, to have guaranteed hours. We understand that not everyone will take advantage of that, but it might just be a lifeline for those who struggle to balance fixed costs such as bills, housing and childcare by taking out the stress of the potential variations that we see so often in zero-hours contracts at the moment. This is a very good thing for the Government to be doing, because one of the key principles in the Bill is the need to restore security and dignity at work, which would be damaged by the amendment. I understand that the noble Lords argued that the wording of the amendment would prevent employers from rejecting guaranteed-hours requests. It is presented as a reasonable compromise that achieves the same outcome, maintaining workers’ rights to guaranteed hours while removing the employer’s requirement to make offers. I disagree with that analysis. It shifts the right from one that is passively applied to one that has to be actively invoked by workers. This means that an individual would have to know their rights and have the confidence to approach their employer in order to benefit from them. As the Secretary of State said, those working on zero-hours contracts are some of the least empowered workers in this country, their contracts are inherently precarious, and those working on them are more likely to be younger, working part time and in low-paid sectors. There are plenty of examples out there of how the allocation of hours has been used by management as a tool of control and, in some cases, a tool of abuse. The Bill already sets out a number of anti-avoidance measures, because we know that that massive power imbalance has to be addressed, and this amendment would fatally undermine all that good work. I have similar concerns about Lords amendments 6 and 7, which seek to impose 48 hours as a reasonable notice period. If passed, these amendments would remove any chance for workers or employers to make representations in a consultation process, and instead force an arbitrary cut-off of 48 hours. Throughout my time as a Minister, we were committed to consulting widely on changes and incorporating the feedback we received into our approach. I remember the Conservatives complaining during the original passage of the Bill that we were not consulting enough, yet now they lend their support to amendments that would chop that consultation off entirely. That said, I must welcome the comments from Opposition Front Benchers in the other place, who indicated that they supported the principle of compensation for cancelled or curtailed shifts. I note that Lord Hunt of Wirral said: “We are fully in agreement that workers deserve reasonable notice of shifts. That is a fair and modern expectation.” —[ Official Report, House of Lords, 14 July 2025; Vol. 847, c. 1612.] Quite how that fits with the Tory pledge to scrap the entire Bill, I do not know. Of course, it is to be expected, as night follows day, that they will object to measures that improve the rights of working people, but that would mean scrapping things that I thought even they supported, including ending non-disclosure agreements for victims of sexual harassment, a new right for bereavement leave for those who have suffered a pregnancy loss, and finally an end to fire and rehire, which they did so much to condemn while in government but did nothing of substance to deal with. That is the Conservative position on this, and it is something that the British people will completely and wholeheartedly reject. Lords amendment 23 relates to unfair dismissal, which is something I know rather a lot about. It seeks to impose a six-month qualifying period for unfair dismissal rights rather than day one rights, which everyone on the Labour Benches has campaigned for. This is another brazen attempt by the other place to remove a clear manifesto commitment. I and other Labour Members were elected on a mandate to introduce basic rights, including unfair dismissal rights, from day one. How can we allow people who essentially have a job for life to prevent millions of people in this country from getting basic employment protections on day one? It is fundamentally wrong that workers can currently be treated so disposably, and that they can be dismissed arbitrarily with no legal recourse for two years. This is about fairness. A worker deserves to be treated with dignity, fairness and respect, no matter how long they have worked for an employer.

• 17 Jul 2025 · Parental Leave · Hansard source

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  Through our landmark Employment Rights Bill, we are making paternity leave and unpaid parental leave day one rights. This aligns then with maternity and adoption leave. But we are going further. We have launched the parental leave review, fulfilling our manifesto commitment. The review will explore how the system can support working families and our modern economy. It will assess the system against four key goals: supporting maternal health; boosting economic growth through increased labour market participation; enabling flexible, balanced childcare choices; and, of course, ensuring the best start in life for our children.

• 16 Jul 2025 · Commemoration of Matchgirls’ Strike · Hansard source

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  I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Stratford and Bow (Uma Kumaran) on securing her first Adjournment debate. She has chosen a topic extremely well and, as she highlighted, it is really important that we draw attention to the incredible courage of the women who participated in the matchgirls’ strike. It is important that this House acknowledges and recognises this very important piece of British history. As my hon. Friend touched on, these young women, many of whom were teenagers, worked in absolutely appalling conditions. We have made great advancements in working conditions in recent decades, but it was a particularly horrendous set of circumstances, even for the time. Women working at the match factory suffered from what was described as phossy jaw, a painful and disfiguring disease caused by exposure to white phosphorus. They endured 14-hour working days in overcrowded and poorly ventilated conditions, and their strike was a watershed moment. It garnered widespread public support, and ultimately forced Bryant & May to concede to their demands. It is right that the names of these courageous women are included on the parliamentary record, and I thank my hon. Friend for doing that. As hon. Members will know, the matchgirls’ strike took place a year before the more famous London dockworkers’ dispute of 1889, which was so formative in the growth of trade unions, including of course today’s GMB union. For the record, I draw attention to my proud membership of the GMB. The organised female workforce showed those working on the docks just what was possible when workers stand up for their rights; they showed that insecurity and unfairness at work never have to be tolerated. The labour movement is a living, breathing one and we can take inspiration from each other, including those who have gone before us in the struggle for improved working conditions. I was pleased to be able to visit the exhibition on the Committee corridor mentioned by my hon. Friend, and I highly recommend that other Members take the time to visit it and learn more about the history of these struggles. The legacy of these women is wholly remarkable. They were part of a trade union movement that achieved so much, as we can see when we look back now: discrimination protection, paid holiday entitlement, paid maternity leave, and the right to request flexible working. So many advances have come from those beginnings. However, as has been touched on, there are still many issues of unfairness that need to be addressed today. A recent survey by the Young Women’s Trust found that 67% of women said they had faced discrimination, 37% believe they have had to endure unsafe working environments, 26% have experienced sexual harassment at work, and 50% had not received pay when off sick. I am pleased to say that we are hoping to address all those matters. My hon. Friend raised an important point about young women’s awareness of their rights at work, and it is crystal clear that we need that in order to be effective in enforcing our rights. I hope that we, as a Labour Government, will be able to trumpet that. My hon. Friend the Member for Stafford (Leigh Ingham) spoke with great passion and made the important point that the courage that these women showed was instrumental in and inspirational to the formation of the Labour party. It was not yet formed at the time of the strike, but the growth of the trade union movement and the belief that Governments at the time were not representing the interests of working people led to the formation of the Labour Representation Committee and then the Labour party itself. We are proud to be a part of that tradition. As a Labour Government, we want to continue the work done by the matchgirls and ensure that workplaces are safe for women. The Employment Rights Bill is helping us achieve exactly that by tackling non-disclosure agreements used to cover up sexual harassment, in a development that only this week has been called world leading. We are strengthening dismissal protections for pregnant women and new mothers, and expanding gender pay gap action plans. As has been touched on, the pivotal role that the fair work agency will have in ensuring that existing and new rights are enforced cannot be overstated. The Employment Rights Bill also addresses insecure work such as exploitative zero-hours contracts and the heinous practice of fire and rehire. We know from research that women are more likely to be in insecure work, with an estimated 650,000 women on zero-hours contracts, compared with 519,000 men. So the struggle continues: the work never ceases but the determination of this Government to address workers’ rights and improve protections in the workplace is undimmed. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Stratford and Bow for her assistance on the Employment Rights Public Bill Committee. She has carried on her keen interest in this area, helping to push for improved rights at work, as well as rightly celebrating those who have had to fight for their rights in the past. The Government’s plan to make work pay is delivering real change for millions of people. The work this Government are doing on our transformative agenda, which is led of course by a woman—the Deputy Prime Minister—shows that we are staying true to the spirit of the matchgirls and the trade union movement, and we are renewing our country so that it once again serves the interests of working people. The Employment Rights Bill is a generational leap forward in workers’ protections, and I believe it will be one of the proudest achievements of this Labour Government. I will turn to my hon. Friend’s points on education. She will know that the Department for Education provides a statutory national curriculum that sets out the subjects and broad content to be taught in maintained schools across England. Within that framework, schools have a degree of flexibility, especially in subjects such as history. There are parts of the history curriculum that lend themselves to teaching about the matchgirls’ strike. In key stage 1, there is teaching about “the lives of significant individuals in the past who have contributed to national and international achievements”, during which “aspects of life in different periods” can be taught. In key stage 3, there is the theme of ideas, political power, industry and empire in Britain between 1745 and 1901. It can also be taught as part of any local history content in the curriculum, which is particularly pertinent in my hon. Friend’s area. By coincidence, when I spoke to my parliamentary assistant just before I entered the Chamber, he told me that he was informed of the matchgirls’ struggles during his education, and I hope that that is repeated up and down the country. Oak National Academy offers a resource on the matchgirls’ strike for year 8 pupils, and resources are also available from the Historical Association, English Heritage and the National Archives. Turning to my hon. Friend’s points on commemoration, this country has a long and well-established tradition of commemorating its national and local individuals through statues and memorials, which serve as a long-lasting reminder of individuals and their efforts for this country and help to bridge the gap between the past and the present. As she will know, it is not normal practice for central Government to fund such monuments, but there is a long history of memorials and statues being funded by public subscription, and the Government support that approach. Experience has shown that investors, including from the private sector, are often happy and willing to fund new memorials. Many organisations—public and private— are rightly able, subject to the relevant permissions, to freely propose, fund, develop and deliver memorials marking a variety of incidents and historical moments in a way that they are best placed to deem appropriate and sensitive. Many successful memorials are created by a wide range of authorities and organisations, which are able to respond sensitively to the particular circumstances that they seek to commemorate.