Question: In September you said the government needed to talk to unions more openly about the major public policy issues in which we've got a proper interest. Has there been a change?

Brendan Barber: I think there have been some improvements I would say. There's been some serious efforts by the government to engage more actively with trade union concerns. I've begun to be a little bit encouraged by some of the change in atmosphere.

Question: Are unions involved in the big conversation? What do you want and what do you expect the TUC to get out of it?

Brendan Barber: We certainly will be playing an active part in developing a response to the whole consultation process. I had the opportunity to address the Labour Party national policy forum in December.

The issues we are emphasising very strongly in thinking through our response is the case for the government to really set out a clear agenda for the workplace. Back in the run up to the 1997 election there was an active dialogue about some of the key measures that were needed and we saw that then take a real concrete shape in the form of the minimum wage, the fairness at work legislation, including new rights for union recognition, and the signing up to the social chapter - which led to an improvements in workplace rights in quite a number of areas.

We haven't had that sense for some time now that there is an agenda for taking forward, better standards in the workplace to solve some of the real problems that many working people face. That's what we want to see developed in the next period in the run up to the next general election. A greater understanding about some of the areas where further changes are still needed.

Question: Why was this allowed to fall off the government's agenda?

Brendan Barber: Well, there've been lots of other issues, of course, taking a lot of political attention.

And one key issue during this second term - and quite rightly so - has been the focus on public service improvements. That's an agenda where we want to engage actively with the government.

One of the welcome developments of recent months has been the establishment of the new public services forum; a body through which we can talk regularly, openly and closely with the government about public service reform, taking that project forward.

There have, obviously, been other issues. The Iraq conflict and the aftermath of that has taken an enormous amount of political energy and attention - and reasonably so - but it's time now to refocus on some of these core issues that matter to millions of people at work.

Question: Are you worried that the Hutton inquiry and the government repairing its reputation will divert the government's attention away from core issues like public services?

Brendan Barber: The Hutton inquiry is a proper approach to a very serious issue. I think it's right that the issues that arise should be subject to that kind of scrutiny. But, yes, I don't want that to be at the expense of a real focus on some of the crucial things that matter to millions of people day in, day out.

I'm looking to really get a better quality of life for millions of people at work, really facing up to, for example, the hugely important crisis in our pension system and tackling the low pay that afflicts far too many people. These are all issues that need a lot of political attention and energy and that is where I want to see the government put in an increasing focus.

Question: You have been brought in to mediate in the dispute between Aslef and the GMB. Is this case undermining the union movement's work?

Brendan Barber: No, that was a difficulty that emerged - an internal matter within Aslef with their staff.

There are now procedures underway to address whatever difficulties emerged and I am confident that the problems will now be amicably resolved.

Question: The PCS civil service is threatening strike action and we are just one year on from fire strikes. Is the government a bad employer?

Brendan Barber: No, I don't think they're a bad employer but there are certainly times, and certainly areas where they're not a good employer and they make mistakes.

This is one of the big challenges that we are putting to the government, to the public services forum.

In managing change they need to make sure that they work with their workforce and take their workforce with them and that they don't seek to achieve change by imposing new arrangements that don't carry people's confidence and support.

Yes, there are some difficult issues in the civil service area at the moment. I hope that the government will pay heed to the strength of feeling of people who work in the Civil Service and that a sensible way forward will be found to solve some of those problems.

But I wouldn't say there's a problem right across every area where the government is the employer. There are a number of areas where they do a bit better than that.

Question: Is the Employment Bill the big step forward in workers' rights that you'd hoped for?

Brendan Barber: It's an important step forward in some respects but there are some areas where we would have wanted to do more.

There will be a number of issues that we will continue to talk to the government about as the bill makes its way through parliament.

We'll be maintaining pressure for amendments to deliver improvements.

There's no doubt that the previous employment bill - which put in place a new recognition arrangement - left a number of unfairnesses in place, in particular excluding people who work in small firms from the new legal entitlement.

Another example is the issue of workers who take part in a perfectly lawful dispute that's met every legal requirement being vulnerable to being dismissed after eight weeks of the dispute.

We don't think that's a reasonable or fair position and we want to see some change on that.

We hope that the government will still be prepared to listen on some of these issues.

Question: Abbey National and Axa are moving jobs to India. Isn't the reality that unions and the government are powerless to stop this kind of action?

Brendan Barber: No. There are clearly a number of organisations that are making decisions of that sort.

There are a number that are going in the opposite direction. I notice that just within the last few days Nationwide building society made a very clear decision that they were not going to be outsourcing jobs overseas. Having weighed it all up, they thought that their organisation was better served by maintaining a workforce here in Britain that closely identifies and understands the needs of their customers. Even though they might have been able to make some kind of marginal saving on labour costs, the overall interest was better served by keeping their operation based here.

Although there are some organisations that are making that decision to move there are others that are not.

Certainly we want to make sure that companies don't just join a headlong stampede thinking that there are easy savings to be made.

They should really weigh these issues up. And weigh into the calculations maintaining the loyalty of their workforce in this country which serves them very well.

Question: Would more companies be persuaded to stay if there were "consumer power" boycotts? Would you back them?

Brendan Barber: Where people aren't convinced that there has been a proper consideration given to all the factors then I know one or two unions have said, certainly, that they think campaigning through applying pressure through a commercial boycott may be a part of the response that they'd want to make.

I think this is a difficult issue but my key point is that employers shouldn't think that these are just simple solutions. Certainly one key issue for us is where organisations do make a decision to move jobs off-shore, we're very concerned about what are the standards available to the workers that are going to be taking those jobs where new bases are going to be located.

In the recent agreement that Unifi, the banking union, reached with Barclay's one key issue is that there are decent pay and conditions and trade union organisations in the new operations that are going to be established in India.

Question: The EU is planning a review of the Working time rules, should they be extended to managerial grades?

Brendan Barber: At the moment the working time directive doesn't require managers to operate within the general 48-hours-a-week limit that the directive looks to apply more generally to other workers.

We're concerned that the existing limit, that can be averaged out over period - so it doesn't have to be every single week - isn't having an impact.

The regulations in Britain aren't being enforced and even where employers are claiming that they technically comply one of the ways they're doing that is using this power of asking individual workers to opt out.

There's evidence clearly available now that individual workers are facing quite unreasonable pressure from employers to sign the opt-out in a way that they're not comfortable with and wouldn't want to do if they had a genuinely free choice. That's a clear abuse that plainly needs to be tackled.

Question: Where does the TUC stand on the EU stability and growth pact? Are the budget cuts demanded by Brussels a price worth paying for UK euro entry?

Brendan Barber: We've argued very strongly that the stability and growth pact needs to be amended. That it's too rigid, that it doesn't reflect the need for borrowing to take place at the appropriate point in the economic cycle so that you can maintain economic growth and for a long period we've argued that there needs to be a new approach taken. There needs to be some significant changes to the growth and stability pact.

Our stance is essentially pro-euro but we've always been very clear that as part of any decision to go for the euro, we'd want to see amendments to that pact.