Ministers kill off draconian ‘rudeness’ Bill
Legislation that would make employers liable for staff harassment by public looks likely to ‘time out’
‘I don’t want to see more burdens put on employers. [They] have too many burdens already’
A “DRACONIAN” Bill which would have let workers sue their employer if a customer offended them will not become law following a Conservative backlash, The Sunday Telegraph can reveal.
Ministers have decided to let the Worker Protection Bill fall after The Telegraph last week revealed the scale of Tory anger the legislation had triggered, with senior Conservatives warning that business owners would be forced to run their establishments like a “police state”.
The Worker Protection Bill is a private members’ bill introduced by Wera Hobhouse, the Liberal Democrat MP, which has been backed by the Government.
If enacted, it would make employers liable for staff being harassed by “third parties” such as customers or members of the public.
It would introduce a legal requirement for companies and public bodies to take “all reasonable steps” to prevent harassment by third parties relating to a “protected characteristic” such as sex, gender reassignment or age.
However, critics fear the legislation would lead to an explosion in costly litigation and force hospitality venues and other businesses to expel clients for “banter” and other trivial incidents.
Lord Frost, the former Cabinet Office minister, described the bill as a “woke, socialist measure” that would “have a chilling effect on every conversation in a workplace”, while another Tory peer said bookshops could be put off inviting authors such as JK Rowling to give talks “knowing that an employee could sue for hurt feelings”.
The scale of the backlash took ministers by surprise and has now prompted a rethink.
A government source said: “We are very alive to the concerns that have been raised… we understand these concerns, we can see them.”
Private members’ bills are usually only debated on a set number of Fridays each parliamentary session.
With Tory peers set to table a range of amendments to the bill, the Government source said there would not be enough time to debate them before the end of the session in the autumn, making “the passage of the Bill impossible”.
While ministers could allocate extra time to push the Bill through if they wanted, this is not expected to happen.
“Ultimately, this Bill will be timed out,” the source said.
They added that the Government was “content that with the concerns that are being raised, it’s worth going away and thinking again how we can achieve what we wanted to achieve with this bill, but in a way that doesn’t have the unintended consequences that colleagues have flagged as being a concern”.
A Tory peer who has been critical of the legislation told The Telegraph that they had also received assurances from the Government that the Bill would not go through. “It certainly needs careful reflection,” they said.
No decision has been taken on what might replace the Bill.
However, the government source indicated that Kemi Badenoch, the minister for women and equalities, was open to returning the focus of any future legislation to preventing the sexual harassment of employees – an element of the current Bill which commands broad support.
The news was welcomed by backbench Conservative MPs.
Jacob Rees-Mogg, the former business secretary, said: “I don’t want to see any more burdens put on employers. I think employers have too many burdens already.”
Craig Mackinlay, the Tory MP for South Thanet, said private members’ bills were often “well-meaning” but launched “without proper consultation or thought”. “This Bill falls very much in this category,” he said.
He added: “Parking for rethinking is the best way forward. I was concerned throughout for the hospitality industry who would have found it virtually impossible to protect themselves against no-win no-fee litigious lawyers.”
Ms Hobhouse said: “If the Government allows this Bill to be ‘timed out’, it would be a betrayal to those who face sexual harassment in the workplace.
“Whenever I present legislation that will act to protect women from horrifying sexual offences, Rishi Sunak’s Conservative Party present a roadblock.
“This government’s unfounded and overblown concerns leave women without safeguards.
“It is a shameful set of circumstances when they decide not to implement transformative legislation for vulnerable workers.”