Speeches by Hinds.

“rose—”

“As the Government look to introduce this hated so-called overnight visitor levy in England—[Interruption.] I believe they are. Labour Members always say, “Don’t worry, it’s not very much money. It will all be hypothecated. It will have no effect on the inbound tourism industry.” Perhaps some of them might look at the e…”

“I can tell the Minister that 3% is a relatively small percentage of 100%, and many of those people are students. The Labour party used to speak about zero-hours contracts as if they were taking over the entire economy, but that is simply not true—they are a perfectly legitimate form of employment that works for some pe…”

“I genuinely do not know quite how to respond to that. The differential has come down. It is due to come down further—it is due to be eliminated. There will still be the difference in national insurance contributions. Nobody is at this time envisaging there being no difference in employment costs at all. The reason that…”

“Well, I will help him with that. That principle is why, back in 1999—under a Labour Government, as he will recall—when the original minimum wage came in, the Low Pay Commission specified that there should be a different rate for young people. That was for two reasons. The first reason was because of the work experience…”

“The hon. Gentleman is right, of course. I do not think anybody in the House of Commons would argue that there should be no employment or workplace regulation at all. [Interruption.] Well—actually, I do not think anybody does, genuinely. I certainly do not. I welcome very many of the rights that have come over the years…”

“Will the Minister give way before he finishes?”

“My right hon. Friend is right. I have spent an inordinate amount of time studying zero-hours contracts, partly because the previous leader of the Labour party, the right hon. Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn), used to bring them up at Prime Minister’s questions every week, and gave the impression that half the…”

“I am spoiled for choice. Who wants to contradict me?”

“We have 109,000 more young people out of work, the youth unemployment rate is at 16%, and our ratio between youth unemployment and overall unemployment is now at European levels. Why do we care about youth unemployment? There are two reasons: first, it is a matter of what is right and of justice for young people; and s…”

“Good employers, who want to keep their employees, do not do stupid things that upset their employees. Good employers will always want to keep good people in order to build their business.”

“I had better not. Although, it always brightens my life to hear from the hon. Gentleman, so I will give way.”

“Of course the hon. Member is right. Nobody wants exploitative zero-hours contracts. Quite often when the Opposition talk about zero-hours contracts, the Government think that the work exploitative automatically gets inserted into the phrase. That is why we stopped exclusivity clauses in zero-hours contracts way back wh…”

“The Minister said that he would not move the amendment in the name of the Prime Minister. I do not think that is unheard of, but I am curious to understand why, having put down such an amendment, the Government would not move it. There are three main things here, and the Minister has talked about two of them: the Emplo…”

“Sooner or later?”

“Sorry, my facial expression was not saying that I thought that was impossible. Most people are online, including old people.”

“I accept that, and we will have to wait for your formal response. Would it be fair to infer from what you are saying that you are against the whole idea?”

“I did not suggest that at all.”

“As the hon. Member for Rossendale and Darwen (Andy MacNae) just said, sports participation underpins so much for young people, building character and resilience, acting in favour of good mental health and tackling obesity. Into old age, too, staying active has huge benefits, as I was discussing just this weekend with t…”

“They may well, but the organisations that all three of you represent use content that has come from someone’s camera phone in a breaking news situation, and that is part of the report. There is a whole sector on the internet of people who do exactly that. They call themselves citizen journalists.”