Speeches by Madders.

“We have had some briefings from Unite, which has given a number of examples of where it has entered into agreements with employers in the hospitality sector, and quite a lot in Scotland. I am not quite sure if that is coincidence or just where they have been organised, but it has reached agreements with a number of emp…”

“The Central Arbitration Committee will be the arbiter of the new rules. There are different views about how effective that is going to be. Is it going to be properly resourced? Perhaps I could just ask the panel to respond to that. Ms Thomas, do you want to go first?”

“That would be your baseline for any 12-week reference period, so if this is going to be an issue for the sector, you would assume that there was a significant number of new hires during that period.”

“Again, the use of the word “temporary” implies that you can put them on a fixed-term or temporary contract, so in terms of the argument about the 12-week reference period, there is a solution there if employers want to take it, is there not?”

“You keep the same level of regulation, but you can spend an awful lot less time on it, if it is presented in the right way.”

“Again, if you have a period when you can anticipate what the demand is going to be, you could, of course, put people on a fixed-term contract, could you not?”

“That is a fair point. A lot of employers will engage practically, but there are always those who are belligerent and hostile to recognition. One that this Committee is aware of is Amazon. Figures from the United States Department of Labor showed that it spent $26 million in 2025 on anti-union consultants. That approach…”

“Do you know roughly what proportion of new hires in hospitality are taken on in November and December time?”

“Obviously, the Law Commission is reviewing the whole law around product liability. Do you think that could ultimately be the answer and the safety net that you need?”

“You do not have the computing power of Amazon, do you? If you can do it, surely it should be able to. Obviously, it has its own gateways, but from what you are saying, it has no real impact anyway. Picking up on the question of consumer perspective, do you feel there should be more public information campaigns about th…”

“It is very clear that there are no sticks at the moment; hopefully that will change. Is there an element of online marketplaces being a very competitive world, and the more that companies are seen to be putting barriers up in terms of checking products for those would-be sellers, the more of a potential inhibitor it is…”

“Which? has been very clear on numerous occasions that there is no real incentive for online marketplaces to police this in the way that we would want. Do they even face any reputational risk at the moment?”

“It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Mr Dowd. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Halesowen (Alex Ballinger) on introducing the debate. There are a lot of ideas and much intent to tackle this problem, because high streets are so evocative. They are a visual symbol of economic challenges and act as an ever…”

“I would like to come back to some evidence you just gave, Kate, about the situation when new technology is rolled out. It seemed to me from what you were saying that not only does this sometimes have quite significant impacts on people’s work, tasks, and how they are utilised—it may have negative or positive effects, a…”

“That is good to hear. It sounds like it should be a template for best practice. In terms of social workers using this software, obviously we know AI sometimes makes mistakes: it hallucinates, it sometimes has inbuilt prejudices. Obviously social workers are making some very, very significant life-changing decisions. Ar…”

“You have obviously thought about this across the entire business. Is it about the software not being quite where it needs to be? Is it about just trying to ask the right questions? Is it just a question of time, or is there any particular reason why you will not achieve everything that you have set out at this stage?”

“Just on that point, presumably if you have a workplace where someone is disciplined for a mistake that AI has generated, you are advising your members to double-check everything, and therefore any productivity gain is lost?”

“You have already mentioned some challenges in delivering that, but are there any others that you have not yet mentioned?”

“Just so we are clear, when you are talking about legacy equipment, is there a date before which this stuff just does not work?”

“I put the same question to Karen. From what you have said, it sounds like you have made massive gains already. Is there much left to do?”