I

THE new government is to be congratulated for the commitment in the King’s Speech that it will honour its manifesto commitment to implement the proposals made in Labour’s Plan to Make Work Pay, the latest version of its New Deal for Working People.

The government’s proposals include major changes: employment rights from day one, doing away with zero-hours contracts, banning “fire and rehire,” easing the conditions for statutory sick pay, allowing workers to take carers’ leave and bereavement leave, ensuring workers have the right to switch off, extending full employment rights to all workers other than those truly in business on their own account, and much else besides.

II

But although most welcome, even if fully implemented these changes to individual rights will not address the real problem faced by the overwhelming majority of our 31 million working people. That problem is lack of power at the workplace, with the vast majority of workers having no control over — indeed, no input into — the terms and conditions on which they work.