Jury Summons - 'pregnancy' related question as part of Equality & Diversity

[waitee]

In the past twelve months I've experienced two miscarriages and sadly have no living children.

I recently received a Jury Summons letter. I filled in my details are there are a few voluntary questions relating to equality and diversity. One of the questions is;

'Are you or have you been pregnant in the past 12months?'

The answer option is either YES or NO. I found this question quite confronting. I am struggling to understand the purpose of the question beyond 'are you pregnant'? I understand that pregnancy is a protected characteristic by law and so I appreciate why it has been asked (along with the usual other ethnicity/gender/religion etc).

However I don't quite understand how the 'have you been pregnant in the past 12months' part relates?

I did seek clarification to the question out of curiosity and have pasted the answer below, but it doesn't really answer my question.

Unless there's an assumption that being pregnant in the past 12 months means live birth and maternity which may also fall under the protected characteristic, then it feels the question is a little grey. I am confused (and slightly triggered!).

What do you think?

--

Under the Equality Act (2010) there are nine Protected Characteristics: age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, sex, sexual orientation.
HMCTS has a public sector duty to ensure we promote equality of opportunity, foster good relations and eliminate unlawful discrimination in the way we deliver our services.

The Protected Characteristic questions are collected as a voluntary survey. They allow us to understand the demographics of people who use our services and their experiences.

This helps us ensure any interaction people have with our system is fair and equal, regardless of who they are.

More information about how HMCTS uses protected characteristics data is available on GOV.UK [HMCTS protected characteristics questionnaire 2023 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)]

I agree with you, cant see any purpose to the question at all. I would personally be a bit annoyed by it, having had a couple of losses myself this year.

It may relate to protection surrounding pregnancy/maternity health issues.

Thanks @Carportforme . Yes confused. I don't understand how them knowing I had a pregnancy 12 and 6 months ago is relevant as it's in the past. I totally understand someone currently pregnant may be relevant

Health and safety reasons and also for jury selection purposes.
Can you imagine a heavily pregnant woman on the jury sitting for hours a day during a trail lasting weeks.

@HughsMermaid thank you, I'm struggling to understand how protection for pregnancy/maternity health issues is relevant if the pregnancies were also miscarriages?

The thing is, you cannot ask if you have given birth to a live child in the last 12 months. So asking if you have been pregnant is a straight catch all.

The Equality Act provides protection for those with pregnancy related illness, including those as a result of most miscarriages.

Answering yes may get you out of it either temporarily or permanently.

I think a lot of these sortbof questions are because people have in the past kicked up a fuss because they've asked the government/council etc a question and not been answered. EG how many women have pregnant women have been called for jury duty. If they didn't collect the information they'd be accused of not caring, by collecting it they get accused of being too nosey.

I tend to bypass these optional questions.

They might be thinking about whether you have a very young baby that may mean you are not available but they might as well just say are you currently pregnant or do you have a child under 1 that you are still feeding. Asking whether you have been pregnant is a completely irrelevant question as far as I can see,

Someone could have ongoing health issues related to miscarriage, perhaps?

I'm very sorry to read of your losses, OP. Just wanted to say that x

Yes I think you're right that this is probably a large factor of the intent behind the question but they can't quite spell it out like that

I fully agree and understand that particular part of the question

Yes I think you're right, they want to ensure they are covering a wide range of demographics - the same with recruitment and workplaces. Although as you say - it's optional to answer them anyway.

That's a good point and thank you for your kind words