Tories pledge to scrap diversity rule after Nowak murder

[Twiglets1]

The Tories have pledged to tear up the requirement for public-sector bodies to promote equality following the murder of Henry Nowak.

Kemi Badenoch has pledged to scrap the “equality duty”, which requires state-sector organisations to foster equality of opportunity between different groups, saying it encourages divisive identity politics.

The party believes the public sector equality duty (PSED) has fuelled a box-ticking mindset under which police officers are advised to treat people differently based on their ethnicity.

The PSED is part of the Equality Act 2010, and tells public bodies they must promote equality of opportunity between those who have a protected characteristic (such as women, black people and gay people) and those who do not.

The Tories believe removing it would restore the principle of equality before the law and stop councils and police forces from advancing “dangerous and divisive agendas”.

In a speech on Tuesday, Mrs Badenoch will say the duty has become a “minefield that exposes almost every significant public decision to legal challenge”.

“A court recently found that prison officials had breached their duty because their separation of prisoners was disproportionately affecting Muslims convicted of Islamic terrorism,” she will say in Westminster.

“These terrorists could now be eligible for compensation. This is madness. This duty is compromising security decisions like isolating dangerous criminals in case the terrorists call us racists.”

She will say the duty leads to “ludicrous outcomes”, such as Norfolk Police telling a job applicant that she was unsuitable because of her gender-critical views.

“The public sector equality duty has turned equality into a zero-sum game where some groups are preferred over others,” she will say. “And the more public bodies chase equality of outcome, the further they move from equal treatment and equality under the law.”

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/06/08/tories-pledge-to-scrap-diversity-rule-after-nowak-murder/

My first paragraph was directly quoted from the Telegraph, same as the rest of it. It was written by the Deputy Political Editor of the Telegraph.

Sorry if that was not clear. Can we move on now to discussing the topic?

You are right @Twiglets1 . The last Conservative governments were just as bad. Their critical mistake being the same as Labour's now. That is to try and win over "centrist" voters by pretending nothing needs radical change.

They were wrong then and Labour are wrong now. We do need to change not only in DEI but elsewhere. But change can happen from the centre if our politicians are honest and have backbone. Because our established politicians are not like this then people gravitate to Farage et al.

Like you I have high hopes for Kemi.

No you didn’t say that & I’m sure most people reading the thread will understand exactly what you did mean which it no way implied that your husband should have to face racism.

The public sector equality duty is essentially about setting a good example and is also about making sure everyone can access public services and has equal opportinuty when applying for jobs. Do you really want to get rid of that? For everyone? Disabled people, gay people, pregnant women, black people?

I think that this does make sense. In the abstract, this duty seems as if it would make a public service more considered in serving the public, but unfortunately “equality” has been co-opted (equality of treatment or of outcome?) and it is time to rethink as to what this duty really adds.

I think that the public sector is always going to have a bit of an issue with this type of thing, because resources are finite even if aims are infinite - once you say “we need to do more for social care” then you are potentially putting that above other things you could be funding for other disadvantaged groups and pitting one disadvantaged group over another constantly to make decisions is not a good way to do things. I feel as if this is sort of where we are now - having efficient public services and trying to engineer social justice are not always going to pull in the same direction

It would be interesting to hear where people think it has been effective, as opposed to tying things up. It has dismally failed in some areas - the figures show that black women are still disadvantaged in maternity care in the U.K.
and there has been a lack of curiosity in terms of tailoring care outcomes to them, despite the U.K. having in theory the potential to collect large scale data to inform experiences. The public sector equality agenda hasn’t exactly been amazing at making that happen. What has been helpful is public campaigns and bad press…

@TheSmallAssassin

No, that would be covered by the main act. Making it harder for groups to access public services and jobs is covered by the main duties of the equality act, which the conservatives are not planning to change.

🤣🤣🤣

Laudable aims… That’s why I think it was well meant but doesn’t seem to be working well in practice.

Really? In which ways is it making access to public services and equal opportunity for employment worse?

So is there a plan for what will replace that in order to achieve the 'laudable aims' or just get rid of it and hope for the best? What is the better idea?

I didn’t say it was making access to public services and equal opportunities for employment worse.

But we already had laws around equal opportunities that make it illegal for employers or public institutions to discriminate on the grounds of sex, race, disability etc.

The “diversity rule” is a newer thing and doesn’t appear to be working well in practice taking Henry Nowak case as an example.

We already have laws around equal opportunities. To uphold the law
and impose strong punishment on those that break people’s rights to be treated equally is something I’m sure we all want to see.

The Public Sector Equality Duty is just about upholding those laws and being seen to do so. You don't think that's a good idea?

I agree with her. All this DEI bullshit means that white, British people are frequently discriminated against and I'm sick of it. If you aren't a minority of some kind you can't get an internship, because 'we're overwhelmed by white British applicants and we need to increase our diversity'. Diversity quotas in hiring are holding businesses and individuals back and they're just downright racist and discriminatory - as long as you are white. If one good thing comes out of the terrible tragedy of Henry Nowak's murder, it will be the abolition of all this woke nonsense.

The PSED is that public sector organisations should go further to engineer outcomes. It is well-intentioned but in practice is deeply damaging.

I worked in a public sector organisation where senior managment took this duty seriously. Every department was set 'targets' as to what the sex and ethnic make-up of their group should look like. One technical department was full of 50-something white males. We were told that it needed to be 40%+ female. We raised that given staff turnover even if we hired only women it would still not hit the target. Our boss simply told us that the target must be met.

In my department, we were not hitting our targets, so kept advertising (and turning down suitable male candidates) until we could find female candidates who hit the bar.

So we were engaging in discrimination in the name of 'equality'. Kemi is 100% right on this one.

A further example of why DEI is bullshit and doesn't work. DH works for a small, niche company. There are about 30 employees, mostly white males. Why? Because that's who applies and has the skillset they need. They have a couple of women, one is their HR person, they also have a couple of POC. A couple of years ago DH got called into a meeting with the boss, who said: 'We really need to up our diversity figures, it's not looking good'. DH suggested that they all take a look at the diversity criteria and ask their current workforce to tick as many of the boxes as they felt able to do, since most of it is 'self identity' rather than anything tangible, like sex. So they did that and their diversity figures were still pretty poor, so DH went into his and ticked pansexual, mixed race (he does have several different nationalities in his ethnic mix), and a couple of others and so did his boss. Job done. And that's why this whole thing is utter, contemptible bullshit.

It makes women only shortlists legal when it wouldn't otherwise be legal. I think there are probably some other examples but I'm hard of thinking what they are right now, assuming the equal pay legislation stays. But I also think that is very dodgy law when it starts dealing with jobs that aren't in any way the same and judging them to be "of equal value".

Exactly and no, I don’t agree with engineering outcomes either.

I do agree with equal opportunities of course.

Don't you think the public deserve to be served by the people most able to do the job at the time?

If there aren't enough people of diversity coming forward for those roles to make the best applicant black or disabled, then that's a different thing than discrimination at recruitment and needs addressing in a different way.

Is this a different Badenoch than the one who was Equalities Minister in 2023?

She is also wrong about class

The Equality Act does have provisions on class - section 1 of the Act! https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2010/15/part/1

Governents (incl the one she was the Equalities Minister in) have not have not applied this provision in England.

https://bsky.app/profile/stevepeers.bsky.social/post/3mnu3k3rqmc26

I think we should have equality but it is currently an unaffordable luxury belief and waste of time to pursue it in this manner in the public sector. So it should not be some obligation, just something people are trained on from infancy. I think she is right in that the legal obligations imposed by this kind of thing end up with the opposite outcome. Namely division and resentment.