The government is to seek progress on the controversial Agency Workers Directive (AWD), secretary of state for business John Hutton has revealed.

Speaking at the Labour party conference in Bournemouth last week, Hutton reiterated the government's desire to press on with the controversial directive via the Warwick Agreement, a concord between the government and unions on the labour market.

Hutton told the conference in his speech: "If globalisation means companies can move across the world — I want them to choose to come here and create British jobs. That is why I made clear at the TUC that — as we fulfil our agreement at Warwick to seek progress in Europe on the Agency Workers Directive — we balance a commitment to the principle of equal treatment with a determination to protect jobs, and continue giving people the choice that agency work currently offers."

The AWD contends that temporary workers should receive the same rights as their permanent counterparts after just six weeks on assignment.

Trade body the Recruitment and Employment Confederation (REC) argues that, while it is not against the directive in principle, the way it is structured needs to be looked at.

"It has to be balanced to make sure it doesn't affect the number of temporary jobs we have in the labour market," Anne Fairweather, the REC's head of public policy, told Recruiter.

"I think we've seen that a number of countries are coming at the AWD with a number of different approaches, and this reflects that labour law is a national system."

Fairweather suggests that the idea of large numbers of agency workers being mistreated, often perpetuated by unions, was a "false portrayal" of the recruitment industry. Unions have argued that the AWD is necessary in order to stop poor treatment of agency workers.

Fairweather adds that there was no evidence to suggest that the AWD was a necessity, and continued: "The AWD has become so high-profile with unions, that it becomes very difficult for them to back down."

Fairweather also met secretary of state for work and pensions Peter Hain to discuss the 'Welfare to Work' agenda and ways of getting the long-term unemployed back into the labour market.

"I told Peter Hain that there are opportunities for working with the private recruitment industry, especially through their contacts with smaller employers."

The government wants the UK to reach 80% employment by 2020. The current employment rate is 74%.