National Insurance Contributions Bill — House of Lords, 2015-01-06
Topic: Labor
Bryan Davies (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I begin with an expression of gratitude to the Minister. As he indicated in his speech, he was kind enough in Committee to indicate the thrust of amendments that would be tabled on Report. He duly fulfilled that promise. Therefore, when I received his letter dated 22 December—I give the House the opportunity to imagine just when I settled down to read this letter—it did not cause quite the degree of consternation that the Minister might have thought. It was not an unfortunate Christmas present but merely confirmed that the Government were in fact carrying out their intentions with regard to the Bill. Therefore, I thank him for his letter, timely as it was As we indicated at Second Reading and in Committee, we are supportive of the broad intent of the Bill and the form of the NICs position. We welcome the particular amendment, but nevertheless have some anxieties which I hope the Minister will assuage. What will be the level of scrutiny to ensure that this change to the NICs position in order to encourage apprenticeships does not result in a rerun in apprenticeships of some of the aspects we have seen of the Government’s obvious enormous delight in the number of self-employed people We are all too well aware that the increase in self-employment conceals in many respects great difficulty for people who cannot get work in any other way, so they engage in the most risky process of advancing and safeguarding their lifestyle. What reassurances can the Minister give that this extension of the reduction in national insurance contributions will not lead to unscrupulous employers using this strategy in order to reduce the taxation that ought to be paid The Minister must know that there are certain areas where self-employment is very significant. We should mention in particular the construction industry. All of us in the House recognise that that industry has particular patterns of labour engagement—that goes without saying. Nevertheless, we also know that evasion can be carried out with regard to taxation in this respect. The noble Lord must appreciate that the addition which this legislation presents as regards the under-25s, for example, might lead to difficulties The Government are passing this Bill without a clear definition of "apprenticeship"; they say that they are working on it. In due course a definition will be introduced in legislation which the Government say will meet the requirements. It is to be subject to secondary legislation at a date that is certainly some way in the future. Given that the Government are emphasising the importance of apprenticeships in this Bill, we would have hoped that the Minister would have got some way towards defining the term. I can give him some illustrations of what a proper definition of apprenticeship might look like. It might indicate that the apprenticeship should normally last for two or three years at the least. It might indicate that apprentices should be new entrants to the area of work rather than existing employees. The fact that the Government have made no real attempt during the passage of the Bill to address these issues means that we fear that what they will do with it, if they have the chance, will reflect their present activities; namely, that a great number of apprenticeships involve merely rebranding workers who are already at a place of work and calling them apprentices without identifying what the skills acquisition and development actually involves.