Let me put the amendment in context. The hon. Member for Huntingdon set out some of the background to the clause. It was the subject of more debate when the Bill passed through the other place than any other clause. We can understand why that is, because it deals with a very sensitive issue, which is the balance between the rights of freedom of association and of freedom to join a political party. That is obviously sensitive territory, and we must proceed with caution and care when legislating in that area.

The legislation is necessary because of the ECHR judgment in the ASLEF v. UK case. As we have heard, that involved ASLEF’s attempts to expel a member of the BNP—I will not repeat the background to the case that the hon. Gentleman has set out. The court, in weighing up the different rights involved, found that UK law as it stands is not compatible with article 11 of the European convention on human rights, concerning freedom of association. I hope that the need to legislate does not divide us. The Government believe that our law should be compatible with the convention. The question is how to legislate, which was at the heart of the debates on the clause in the other place.

Before introducing the Bill, the Government consulted on two options. The first was a deregulatory approach that would simplify the law and give unions broad  powers on the matter. The second was a more specific approach, broadly along the lines of the current clause 18. The Government originally adopted the deregulatory approach, but that aroused fierce controversy in the other place across the political parties. We have heard that Lord Lester of Herne Hill was very vocal on the issue, as was Lord Morris of Handsworth, who spoke on the subject at Second and Third Reading. After a great deal of discussion, with those eminent peers in particular—one of whom is one of the country’s most eminent human rights experts and the other is one of the country’s most eminent trade unionists—as well as consideration of the views of the Joint Committee on Human Rights, the Government agreed to amend the clause to create the current clause 18.

The current clause 18 does two things. It restores the provisions relating to “protected conduct”, meaning membership of a political party, which the previous clause would have repealed. It then sets out three safeguards for when a trade union proposes to expel or exclude someone on the basis of party membership. One of those safeguards relates to the subject of amendment No. 19. I shall concentrate on that rather than the other two.

Exclusion or expulsion should not result in

“exceptional hardship by reason of not being, or ceasing to be, a member of the union.”

In other words, the exceptional hardship must be directly related to not being a member of a union. That is set out at proposed new subsection (4G)(c) in clause 18. The phrase “exceptional hardship” has been the focus of the debate. We did not choose it at random; it was the phrase used in the ECHR judgment, paragraph 43 of which states:

“Such abuse might occur, for example, where exclusion or expulsion from a trade union was not in accordance with union rules or where the rules were wholly unreasonable or arbitrary or where the consequences of exclusion or expulsion resulted in exceptional hardship”.

It is the same phrase used by the Joint Committee on Human Rights when it considered the matter. Its report on how the clause should be amended said that

“the exclusion or expulsion of the individual is permitted only if...the decision” is

“taken in accordance with the union’s rules and a fair procedure;...the union’s rules are not wholly unreasonable; and...the consequences of exclusion or expulsion would not result in exceptional hardship.”

The test we have set in the clause is therefore the same as the test quoted in the judgment by the ECHR and referred to in the report on that issue by the Joint Committee on Human Rights.

Reference has been made to loss of livelihood. Paragraph 50 of the judgment states that such a case would not result in exceptional hardship:

“As there was no closed shop agreement for example, there was no apparent prejudice suffered by the applicant in terms of his livelihood or in his conditions of employment.”

Not being a member of the union did not mean that the individual would lose his job, which could have been the case when a closed shop existed in this country, and that was referred to in the ECHR judgment.