Equal Opportunities

It is a legal requirement for employers to ensure that people are not treated unfairly, and that everyone has access to the opportunities he or she deserves as a fundamental human right.

 

It is therefore unlawful to discriminate on the grounds of someone's sex, sexual orientation, marital status, race, colour, age (from October 2006), nationality, ethnic origin, religion, beliefs, or because of a disability, pregnancy or childbirth. It is also unlawful to discriminate against part-time workers or on the grounds of somebody's membership or non-membership of a trade union.

 

Great care is required to be taken by the employer to ensure that the organisation complies with the law. As a partner/customer of Seetec we can provide information, advice and guidance on this complex subject. Some areas that are typically overlooked by employers include:

 

Careful attention has to be paid to the wording of recruitment advertisements as somebody who is not an employee can take an employer to an employment tribunal if they believe they were not selected for a job for discriminatory reasons. Advertisements seeking over "50s", "fit people" or "women" would all be in breach of the law unless there was a genuine occupational requirement. Certain questions should not be asked, either directly or indirectly, during interviews.

 

Employers must ensure that there is no sexual harassment within the work place. This includes insensitive jokes, the display of materials that can be deemed to be sexually explicit, gestures, sexual innuendo etc.

 

It is unlawful for any employer/service provider, regardless of size, to discriminate against a disabled person because they are disabled or for a reason related to their disability, unless it can be justified (See Employer Fact Sheet Number 2 Disability Discrimination Act). An employer/service provider must make reasonable adjustments (See the Reasonable Adjustments page) to enable a disabled person to work or receive the service.

 

In general, by focusing on a person's skills and abilities in all cases helps to avoid discrimination in an employment context. This is particular true in the case of redundancy, which is traditionally prone to age discrimination decisions. To avoid this, base decisions on objective, job-related criteria to ensure the skills needed to help the business are retained.

In the case of retirement, employers must ensure that retirement schemes are fairly applied; taking both individual and business needs into account.

 

Positive discrimination is unlawful, but taking positive action to address inequalities in gender, ethnicity, disability, sexual orientation etc is perfectly acceptable. In other words taking a particular action with an individual because they come from a disadvantaged group regardless of whether they have the relevant skills/abilities and qualifications is unlawful. However taking an action which positively promotes under-represented groups, for example, special single-sex training initiatives either to equip people to work in jobs more often carried out by members of the opposite sex, or to return to work after a period at home looking after children or other dependants is acceptable.