Skip to main content
Regional secretary with the National Education Union
What should a new Ministry of Labour look like?
Labour’s manifesto pledges to create a Ministry of Labour – but what form should it take and what powers should it have?

THE Labour Party’s manifesto for the 2017 general election contained many provisions for radical labour law reform.  

At the heart of these proposals was the plan to introduce a new Ministry of Labour.   

This is a recommendation that hit the spot, for rarely can the plan to create a new government department have met with such enthusiasm and expectation.   

The 95th Anniversary Appeal
Support the Morning Star
You have reached the free limit.
Subscribe to continue reading.
More from this author
Staff onboard the moored Pride of Kent at the Port of Dover
Features / 17 November 2023
17 November 2023
A Labour government would be wise to implement new recommendations from the ILO that would protect trade unionists and their right to bargain collectively, writes Professor KEITH EWING
(L to R) A postcard of the original Wellesbourne Tree where
Features / 11 July 2023
11 July 2023
New writing has underlined the importance of the 1873 case that victimised striking farmworkers and led to a national outcry — yet aspects of the law used against them remain on the books, writes professor KEITH EWING
Transport Secretary Grant Shapps
Features / 26 August 2022
26 August 2022
The latest plans to suppress industrial action are chilling. They are the hallmark of authoritarian government – and worse, argues Prof KEITH EWING
STATE v WORKERS: Docker Vic Turner (centre), one of the Pent
Features / 30 June 2022
30 June 2022
On the 50th anniversary of the jailing the Pentonville Five, Professor KEITH EWING recalls how British governments, Tory and Labour, have systematically adapted the law to suppress legitimate trade union activity
Similar stories
Junior doctors on the picket line outside St Thomas' Hospital, London, during their continuing dispute over pay. Picture date: Thursday June 27, 2024
Workers' Rights / 18 July 2025
18 July 2025

It is only trade union power at work that will materially improve the lot of working people as a class but without sector-wide collective bargaining and a right to take sympathetic strike action, we are hamstrung in the fight to tilt back the balance of power, argues ADRIAN WEIR

Members of the National Education Union (NEU) hold a rally o
Features / 18 January 2025
18 January 2025
As the Employment Rights Bill enters Parliament, JAMES HARRISON introduces a podcast designed to help trade unionists, as well as MPs, understand its intentions and how to go about improving it
Features / 11 October 2024
11 October 2024
Labour’s long-awaited Employment Rights Bill does not do nearly enough to remove the restraints on trade unions or to give them the powers they need to make a significant difference to the lives of the millions of workers, write KEITH EWING and Lord JOHN HENDY KC
James Harrison, director of the Institute of Employment Righ
Features / 10 August 2024
10 August 2024
Newly appointed director JAMES HARRISON sets out his vision for the Institute of Employment Rights, balancing healthy scepticism of Labour’s promises with proactive efforts to improve and expand workers’ rights