HR Industry News

Consultation launched on new equality legislation

— 20 June 2007 —

The government is planning to modernise discrimination legislation and has published a consultation document that includes proposals for a Single Equality Bill.

Discrimination law is currently contained in nine major pieces of legislation, which the government believes can act as a barrier to fairness.

The Single Equality Bill outlined in the Discrimination Law Review would put the law on equality and discrimination in one place, supported by clear practical guidance.

Communities secretary, Ruth Kelly MP, says that equality law is not about some abstract concept, it is about how every one of us is treated at work, as customers and by our public services.

Our consultation document aims to provide clearer and more effective protection from discrimination wherever people are faced with it in their everyday lives.

The review calls for a full and informed debate before bringing forward legislation and the government is also seeking views on a number of issues ranging from improving access for disabled people to setting up specialist courts.

Trevor Phillips, chairman of the Commission for Equality and Human Rights, said that the government is right to address the impenetrable thicket of equality legislation that too often leaves everyone baffled as to what our rights might be.

Ceridian’s Paul Avis stressed that “disability discrimination and equality are the hardest areas to manage because diversity strategies and ambitions are often undermined, at a case by case level, by intransigent managers and systemic exit strategies such as ill health retirement options. In addition, many disabled people are not born disabled so unlike gender or race, newly disabled employees have a lot more to contend with. I hope that the new legislation recognises the specific challenges of disability equality.”

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