4. Submissions on Behalf of the Trades Union Congress by Mr Jacobs

Mr Jacobs: Thank you, my Lady, I’ll carry through to the end unless I’m wanted to pause at any point for the –

Lady Hallett: Carry on, if you can.

Mr Jacobs: This is the joint opening statement of the Trades Union Congress, the TUC, and the Scottish Trades Union Congress, the STUC.

The TUC and the STUC are separate organisations but with shared aims and values.

The 54 unions affiliated to the TUC represent over 5 million working people across a range of sectors across the four corners of the UK. The STUC is a national lobbying, campaigning and co-ordinating body for trade unions for Scotland and represents over 545,000 trade union members.

Both the TUC and STUC aim to provide a voice for working people and to shine a light on the consequences of decision-making for the experiences of those at work.

Tomorrow the Inquiry is to hear evidence from Roz Foyer, general secretary of the STUC.

This opening submission will highlight the loss and sacrifice of those in the workplace in Scotland and focus on the approach to decision-making within central government.

From the union perspective, that decision-making was one which no doubt had its deficiencies but was, in Scotland, nonetheless underpinned by a process of meaningful consultation and partnership, which was welcome.

Inevitably, it is impossible not to frame the Scottish perspective, and no doubt that of Wales and Northern Ireland in due course, as a counterpoint to that of Westminster. It is an illuminating counterpoint. Module 2 has heard evidence of shocking dysfunction in the UK Government response, with decision-makers repeatedly oscillating between the pursuit of varying objectives against a background of bitter squabbling resembling something of a playground politics.

The decision-making in respect of Scotland is yet to be explored in these oral hearings, but the indications thus far, we suggest, are of a more professional, mature and open form of decision-making within Scottish Government.

As with our opening submissions in Modules 1 and 2 of this Inquiry, we begin, however, by acknowledging the loss and sacrifice during the pandemic in the workplace, on this occasion of course in the particular context of the Scottish workplace.

We also acknowledged the power and tragedy of the human stories told in the impact film this morning, and we acknowledge that they are stories of a kind replicated by so many others across Scotland.

We have provided to the Inquiry a paper by the Scottish Centre for Administrative Data Research. It describes that in Scotland, men working in elementary service occupations, such as kitchen assistants and waiters, along with large goods vehicles drivers and taxi drivers, had exceptionally high mortality rates. Among women in Scotland, higher rates were also observed in elementary occupations, including industrial cleaning operations, packers, bottlers and canners. Higher mortality rates were also observed among female workers employed as process plant and machine operatives, such as those in food, drink and textile industries, assemblers and sewing machinists, postal workers, couriers and shelf fillers.

The differences in mortality rates between sectors reflects both occupational risk and the social class gradient in health outcomes. That, of course, is consistent with the evidence of Professors Marmot and Bambra in Modules 1 and 2, some of which was summarised this morning by Mr Dawson.

It all points to one of the profound consequences of the pandemic, that those who were generally less well off, with greater disadvantage and vulnerability, paid the greater price. It was true of Scotland as it was across the UK. It was the price paid by people who kept parcels being delivered to our doors, who transported key workers to work, who processed our food, who stacked our shelves, who cared for our sick and elderly, and many others.

We touch, my Lady, on two points of context, upon which we do not focus in our written or oral submissions, but we wish to acknowledge their importance.

The first is that of pandemic preparedness, or rather lack of it. The state of preparedness in Scotland is already being examined in Module 1, as Mr Dawson has explained. The evidence heard by this Inquiry indicates that the deficiencies in preparedness were shared across Westminster and the devolved administrations. Whatever the merits of Scottish decision-making, the outcomes were ultimately limited by lack of preparedness. Given the misplaced confidence that the UK was prepared, it was not just a standing start at the beginning of the pandemic; it was a standing start facing in the wrong direction.

We certainly wish the members of the TUC and STUC affiliated unions to understand that this crucial issue of pandemic unpreparedness is already under careful consideration by this Inquiry, including in relation to Scotland, albeit in a different module.

The second point of context is that of austerity. The Inquiry has received bountiful evidence primarily in Module 1 as to the resilience of public services going into the pandemic and, therefore, inevitably, as to the legacy of austerity. Just as the achievable outcomes in Scotland were limited by pandemic preparedness, they were also limited by public services having been hollowed out over the preceding period. These two features loom large over the decision-making with which this module is centrally concerned.

We turn to the issue of government consultation and partnership with the unions. As Roz Foyer explains as general secretary of the STUC, the organisation has had a successful history of engagement and working with the government in Scotland, both through established formal and informal processes. It is characteristic, we would suggest, of a more open culture generally within Scottish Government, that includes working constructively and meaningfully with external partners, whether they be unions, businesses, academics, Children’s Commissioners and many others.

This consultative approach generally managed to subsist throughout the pandemic. It was framed at the outset in a joint statement by the Scottish Government and the STUC titled “Fair Work during the COVID-19 Crisis”. It described an approach where workers, trade unions and employers worked together constructively to reach the right decisions on all workplace issues that arise throughout the crisis.

The structures used for that working together, both pre-existing and implemented by way of response to the pandemic, are described both in the STUC’s evidence and in that of Scottish Government witnesses. Fiona Hyslop, then Cabinet Secretary for Economy, Fair Work and Culture, proactively contacted the STUC in March 2020 to seek its support in pandemic response and a regular format for meetings was established.

The consultation was important, not least as the STUC was uniquely placed to gather information, identify concerns and offer advice further to its representative structure covering all parts of the voluntary and public sector in Scotland.

That structure enables direct reporting and feedback from key workers who were delivering emergency and essential services. To put it in the context of the workplace impact we have described, it should give the government a line of sight on the practical issues facing those high-risk, high-vulnerability occupations in which mortality was high.

However, it is not just that a line of communication existed, to some extent lines of communications to stakeholders existed in Westminster. What is more fundamental is whether the communication is meaningful, whether it is placatory or open to challenge, whether it is dismissive or interested. As this Inquiry has heard in an earlier module, the Westminster and Number 10 approach was best described by the less favourable of those adjectives. It is encapsulated by the note of Boris Johnson describing in a meeting with senior ministers that he “can’t have the bollocks of consulting with employees and trade unions”.

In our lengthier written submissions we set out some of the detail on the way in which this consultation fed into and enhanced a number of areas of decision-making. One of the striking examples is in relation to government policy on face coverings. The Scottish Government, urged by unions, generally succeeded in adopting a precautionary approach and advocating or requiring the use of face coverings, given the potential benefits and limited costs of doing so.

In contrast, the UK Government lagged behind, and the evidence in Module 2 revealed that it did so by taking an oppositional approach to unions. Reference was made in internal communications to Boris Johnson backing a “no surrender to unions” approach, which he totally regrets later. It was antithetical to precautionary, mature and open decision-making, and in contrast with the decision-making in Scotland.

Another example is the adequacy of financial support for low income workers required to self-isolate and the inadequacy of statutory sick pay. The evidence considered in Module 2 revealed that the UK Government was being urged from all sides to increase the support for self-isolation, particularly financial support.

That included not just calls from unions but from UK Chief Medical Officer, the Chief Scientific Adviser, from SPI-B, from the behavioural scientists, from the Department of Health and Social Care, from regional mayors, and others.

The evidence in this module indicates that the Scottish Government, having listened to unions, was another voice urging the UK Government to adopt a different approach.

That is not to say, of course, that there were not shortcomings. There were many examples of the STUC being given little to no time to respond adequately to complex documents or to ensure that representatives with the right level of expertise about a sector were present for meaningful dialogue.

The STUC often found itself inadequately resourced for the engagement that was being sought by the Scottish Government. There are lessons to be learned about the need for Scottish Government when engaging with stakeholders to ensure that the organisations are given the assistance they need to develop the capacity and infrastructure to contribute to decisions meaningfully and at pace.

There were also many occasions where the STUC raised serious concerns with Scottish Government ministers about decisions that, in the STUC’s view, had lacked appropriate consultation.

My Lady, it is, however, in the nature of decision-making that aspires to be the product of meaningful consultation that what is achieved is progress towards that aspiration rather than perfection.

Next, we address the differences in culture between Scottish Government and Westminster. We set out in our written submissions in more detail some of the differences which appear to us to be apparent. For example, the Scottish Government appears to have been quicker to work within clear and agreed frameworks for decision-making. The Inquiry can consider whether Westminster’s careering between different objectives was a feature of the characters in power, the Prime Minister who was widely referred to internally as the trolley, or whether it may have been assisted by the frameworks for decision-making more readily used in Scotland.

Some of the evidence suggests that the meetings of the Scottish Cabinet appeared to have been, in substance, decision-making meetings, where various members of Cabinet contributed before First Minister exercised final sign-off. The use of formal decision-making in Scottish Government forums contrasts with the ever diminishing circle of decision-makers that appears to have taken hold in Number 10, often meeting informally and guided by the belief that the intellect of a very small few will come good.

There also appears to have been an important basic professionalism that was lacking in parts of Number 10 and Westminster more generally. Nicola Sturgeon describes that the working environment within Scottish Government during the pandemic was professional, serious and formal, and titles such as First Minister, Deputy First Minister, Cabinet Secretary would be used in meetings. At the same time in Westminster, a male-dominated group of ministers were urging each other to “back the Gavster”, a reference to Sir Gavin Williamson, were laughing about “Hancockian timetables”, a reference to Mr Hancock, and other examples which must be thousands in number.

In examining decision-making in central government, the Inquiry will no doubt look carefully at the extent to which decision-making was influenced by the cultures that existed within UK and devolved governments.

Finally, we touch briefly on collaboration between Scottish and Westminster governments and divergence.

Primarily, we urge caution in considering the narrative suggested by some that the Scottish Government sought difference for difference’s sake. On analysis, differences appear to have been in appropriate pursuit of public health objectives. It is difficult to see, for example, what criticism could be levelled at the Scottish Government for diverging from the UK approach on 12 March 2020 in banning gatherings of over 500 people, or for taking a more precautionary approach in respect of the use of face masks.

My Lady, it would be surprising if in a future pandemic either nation adopts an approach that is reluctant to issue guidance on face masks or to ban mass gatherings when hospitals are on the precipice of being overwhelmed.

In fact, as the Scottish Government announced on 12 March the banning of large events, in England the Cheltenham Festival was in full flow. That doesn’t stand as a symbol of Scottish divergence; it stands as a monument of deficiencies in UK Government decision-making.

Divergence may also reflect limitations in co-operation. The devolved administrations were not routinely included in Covid-O and Covid-S meetings, many in Scottish Government described the perception that the government did not work together to make decisions and the UK Government generally made decisions unilaterally. That perception dovetails with the evidence heard by this Inquiry that, for example, Mr Johnson did not want to meet with the leaders of the devolved nations for fear of it appearing to be a “mini EU”, and such meetings being, such was his view, “constitutionally a bit weird”.

It is also evident that the divergence in approach between administrations worked both ways. The UK Government equally diverged from the wishes of the Scottish Government. It points to the force of an observation by Ken Thomson, who dismisses any implicit understanding that Westminster’s approach was orthodox, from which other parts of the UK diverged.

We conclude, my Lady, with this observation: to some witnesses in Module 2, the deeply unattractive side of the internal dysfunction within the UK Government was just Westminster. Correct or otherwise, it cannot be said to be just politics. As the evidence in Module 2A demonstrates, a more mature, professional and open form of central government is achievable. It is submitted that the evidence in this module demonstrates the value of a form of government that is open to and meaningfully engages with the views of stakeholders, including trade unions. It is an approach of consultation and engagement which should be embraced and strengthened in a future pandemic.

Thank you, my Lady.

Lady Hallett: Thank you very much, Mr Jacobs.

Right, we’ll break now and I shall return at 3.20.

(3.06 pm)

(A short break)

(3.20 pm)

Lady Hallett: Rory Phillips King’s Counsel.