Battle Lines Drawn Over New Employment Rules

With echoes of the Great Depression of the 1930s they have been on the march in Jarrow again this weekend.

As unemployment rises and unions prepare for a scrap over workers' rights, the Government and more particularly the Conservative Prime Minister and his Chancellor - on the eve of their party conference - are talking tough about clamping down on red tape hampering business and welfare cheats.

Aimed squarely at the Tory rank and file and the critics of the Government's plans for the economy, David Cameron and George Osborne are setting out their stall.

But Andrew Cave, from the Federation of Small Businesses , says: "The Government's policies at the moment seem schizophrenic.

"On the one hand they want to boost employment and on the other they're throwing hurdles in the way of employers... potential employers actually creating jobs."

Something Mr Osborne wants to do is to double the amount of time a worker needs to be employed by a company from one to two years before he or she can take a case to an industrial tribunal.

Mr Cameron will announce he is scrapping the 12-week time limit that jobseekers currently have to turn down work.

He will also take away dole money completely from anyone who spends more than six months in work clubs, and those who are claiming the benefit may have to justify what they are doing to find work.

Shadow Treasury minister Chris Leslie says the Government's top two have got it wrong.

"We've got to have welfare reform, but if we have more people on the dole it's going to cost more," he says.

"The idea that attacking employment rights is going to be somehow a route to prosperity - that's just not going to happen."

Union leaders say the Tories are simply spoiling for a fight.

The TUC 's Sarah Veale believes "it's all about grandstanding for the Conservative Party conference".

With the TUC planning a big march in Manchester on Sunday to coincide with the party conference beginning in the city, the battle lines are being drawn for the Government and unions to fight it out this autumn over workers' rights.