Not for sale

31.10.12 - Felicity Appleby

I started working for Unions Together about six months ago and it seems like every single day this Government has come out with a new attack on protections for working people.

But soon the Government are putting forward one of the most offensive, made-up-on-the-back-of-an-envelope attacks on our rights at work that you can imagine. Today is the Second Reading of the Growth and Infrastructure Bill - a Bill that will literally put our rights at work up for sale.

Their plan, which has been called ‘shares for rights’, will allow businesses to offer employees tax-free shares in exchange for them giving up their rights.

We need you to sign our letter to David Cameron and George Osborne, and tell them that our rights at work are not for sale by clicking here.

Osborne and Cameron don’t have a plan for creating jobs and growing the economy. That’s why they keep coming up with ever more extreme ways of attacking employee protections.

The ‘shares for rights’ plan will allow small and medium-sized businesses to ask new employees to give up some of their key rights at work, in exchange for shares in the business. For as little as £2000 in shares, employees may have to give up the right not to be sacked unfairly, redundancy rights, as well as flexible working and maternity rights.

This plan is not only offensive, it’s also absurdly complicated. It will actually create more red tape for employers rather than reduce it.

The Government should be concentrating on fixing our economy, and getting people back into work, not on inventing hare-brained schemes to make it easier to fire people.

That’s why we’re going to send Cameron and Osborne a massive letter, from thousands of us, telling them that our rights at work are not for sale.

You can help stop this bill by clicking here to add your name to the letter.

Felicity