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Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill

My Lords, I support everything that the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, and other noble Lords have said. I cannot understand how the Government can enter into what is supposed to be a binding arbitration and then ignore the result of it. If that does not destroy trust in the system, I do not know what does. To use the law to deal with industrial relations has always been difficult. Your Lordships will recall that at the beginning of the previous century a Liberal Government freed up the trade union movement and permitted it to strike. I always thought that the Labour Party supported such movements. Here the Government put restrictions on the police and Prison Service. We do not say that those restrictions are necessarily wrong but there is a price to pay for that. We have talked about the military covenant which the Government do not always uphold. There has to be seen to be a covenant with the police and the Prison Service to act honourably and fairly with them. The Government have lost the trust of police and Prison Service officers and I do not think that they will regain it for a very long time.