Hard labour

Gordon Brown's pledge to introduce stronger rights for agency workers - and allow millions more employees to demand flexible working - is hard to swallow. This double dose of planned legislation would mark an extension of employment laws for which there is little need. Big employers will cope. But small businesses must be wondering what they did to deserve this body blow.

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Downing Street's backing for union demands to give nearly 1.5m "temps" statutory rights to the same basic pay as permanent workers, albeit after a probable qualifying period of about 12 weeks, flies in the face of its earlier opposition to European Union proposals that should never have emerged from the deep freeze.

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There is a limit to how much flexibility workplaces can accommodate. As more staff request flexible hours, the bias in favour of acceptance may weaken. Workers without children may resent having to cover for colleagues' absences. Bosses could say yes to staff they want to keep and no to those they can lose.

With the economic slowdown yet to bite, and unemployment starting to rise, this is the worst moment to introduce burdensome new employment law. Mr Brown should rethink before he makes another mistake.

Remember the rule:

• when things are improving, you don't want to threaten the upwards movement;
  
• when things are doing well, you don't want to cause the economy to slow down;
  
• when things are turning south, you don't want to make things worse;
  
• when things are going badly, it's the perfect time to "reform" and deregulate labor markets - workers will be in no position to resist.