The Equality Bill
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12 May 2009
The highly awaited Equality Bill, which
was published on 27 April 2009,
aims to combine all of the existing anti discrimination legislation
dealing with sex, race, disability, sexual orientation, religion or
belief and age into one statute.
The Government's White Paper states that:
- Despite progress since 1997 to reduce
the gender pay gap, women still earn, on average, 22.6% less per hour
than men;
- Less academically able, but better off
children, overtake more able, poorer children at school by the age of
six;
- The gap between the employment rate of
disabled people and the
overall employment rate has decreased from 34.5% to 26.3% since 1998,
but disabled people are still more than twice as likely to be out of
work than non-disabled people;
- If you are from an ethnic minority, you
were 17.9% less likely to
find work in 1997 than a white person. The difference is still 13%;
- One in five older people are
unsuccessful in getting quotations for motor insurance, travel
insurance and car hire; and
- 6 out of 10 lesbian and gay school
children experience homophobic bullying and many contemplate suicide as
a result.
It is clear that discrimination is still
widespread in today's society and further action is needed in order to
reduce this.
Indeed, the Government states that if no
action is taken now:
- the pay gap between men and women will
not close until 2085; and
- it will take almost 100 years for
people from ethnic minorities to get the same job prospects as white
people.
The Equality Bill will strengthen the
existing equality law by:
1. Introducing a new public sector duty to
consider reducing socio-economic inequalities;
2. Putting a new Equality Duty on public
bodies;
3. Using public procurement to improve
equality;
4. Banning age discrimination outside the
workplace;
5. Introducing gender pay reports;
6. Extending the scope to use positive
action;
7. Strengthening the powers of employment
tribunals;
8. Protecting carers from discrimination;
9. Protecting breastfeeding mothers;
10. Banning discrimination in private
clubs; and
11. Strengthening protection from
discrimination for disabled people.
The Government's White Paper provides some
useful examples as to how the above can be implemented in practice.
The Government hopes that the Bill will be
enacted next year.
Corinne Day is a trainee
solicitor who specialises in information
technology law and intellectual property law. She can be contacted via
e-mail on corinne.day@lawdit.co.uk
About the Author
Lawdit
Solicitors
offer services and advice for litigation, commercial contracts,
Intellectual
Property and IT legal agreements. We are experts in commercial law with
a heavy emphasis on Intellectual Property, Internet and e-commerce law.
Lawdit is a member of the International Trademark Association, the
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