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brap comments on new Equality Bill

Commenting on the Equality Bill published yesterday, Joy Warmington, CEO of brap, said:

“While many of the proposals contained in the Equality Bill are welcome, it is important to recognise that legislation is not a magical panacea when it comes to achieving equality.

“The first equality law was passed forty years ago. Since that time, despite nine other major pieces of legislation, we’ve seen only limited progress on equality issues.

“The new Equality Bill has the potential to be more of the same. For example, one of its main proposals is to extend the previous duties on public bodies to promote race, gender, and disability equality to other ‘groups’. While this is welcome, it’s unclear why this should help achieve equality at any faster rate.

“If we are ever to enjoy the benefits of a fair society, we have to change the way we think about equality. Legislation is only part of that process.

“The new Bill will ask larger organisations to reveal their gender pay gaps. This may help tackle the disadvantage that arises when women are paid less than men for the same job. However, it will do little to address the fact that work traditionally done by women is paid less – mechanics earn more than nurses; bus drivers are paid more than secretaries.

“To tackle this kind of structural and systemic inequality we need to change the way we think about equality and have a clearer idea about what we will do as a result of the data we collect. Changing the status quo is hard and putting energy behind this agenda will be challenging in a recession. However, if we don't pay attention to these issues we may find that some of the most disenfranchised within our society are even farer behind when the recession is over.

“In 2005 the government set up the Equalities Review to look into why persistent disadvantage still exists. The Review came up with a series of thoughtful, wide-reaching, and progressive recommendations that were welcomed at the time by a range of stakeholders.

“Chief among those recommendations was the suggestion that we rethink our understanding of equality. Instead of thinking of equality ‘just’ in terms of people getting equal treatment, opportunities, or resources, the Review convincingly argued that we should see equality in terms of removing the barriers that stop people achieving their full potential. This may involve treating people differently so that they can be treated fairly.

“brap believes this approach has the potential to reinvigorate our pursuit of equality. By stating clearly and explicitly that fairness means removing the barriers that hold people back, we give licence to organisations and communities to be bold in their efforts to fight discrimination.

“Over the next few weeks brap will be working closely with a range of organisations to show how a deeper understanding of human rights can promote this approach.”

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The Equalities Bill
written by Deirdre LaBassiere , May 21, 2009

Very astute and correct observations on the part of Mrs Warmington.

It appears that the bill is sensibly worded in order to address the key issue of pay inequality, which badly affects the male dominated sectors, the usual suspects being the IT industry, the legal arena and such like. Also, it is my view that it is certainly not something for businesses to fear.

There has been a knee-jerk reaction from some sectors that “it will hurt business, especially SMEs”. This is totally unjustified.

The pay audit requirement only applies to companies with over 250 staff.

The other negative reaction from, quite frankly, old-school male-dominated business groups was that this would force pay rises at a time of recession. There are again two key things have not been taken into consideration:

1.Nothing in this regard comes into effect until 2013.
2.It does not require you to pay staff more - just pay the guys less, perhaps?

I welcome the Equality Bill but I believe that a change in culture from the businesses themselves must be the pervading vehicle to drive the legislation.

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