Campaign Launch: Why it's time to review the Equality Act. 60 tickets left.

[PencilsInSpace]

You know how we are constantly being told that there are no planned changes to the EA, and that therefore the proposed changes to the GRA don't affect us?

Well, it turns out a group of politicians are launching a campaign to review the EA.

The launch event is free to attend, Wed 20th June, 4-6 pm, House of Commons

Description

The Equality Act 2010 was established to cover nine protected characteristics: Age, Disability, Gender Reassignment, Marriage or Cvil Partnership, Pregnancy and Maternity, Race, Religion or Belief, Sex, and Sexual Orientation.

However, in 2018 alone, we have seen the gender pay-gap issue, punish a Muslim day letters, concerns about anti-Semitic attitudes and behaviour, and the Windrush Scandal. All of these issues have in common the way in which they compel us to question what equality means in today's society. A number of characteristics such as homelessness, ethnicity, and poverty, although can give rise to discrimination, are not covered by the act. We believe that the equality act needs to be strengthened in order to ensure that we live in a fair and equal society for all.

We are marking the launch of our campaign with an event in Parliament titled "Why it's time to review the Equality Act?". Our speakers include:

1. Afzal Khan MP and Shadow Minister for Immigration
2. Baroness Ruby McGregor-Smith
3. Wes Streeting MP
4. Shabana Mahmood MP
5. Jess Philips MP
6. Mark Lewis (Solicitor)

I'm going to this.

Joanie Walsh, the journalist was also there.

the need to bridge the gap between those on the inside and those on the outside.

Who are the 'inside' though? We still don't know.

It's not just that the young women who were running this event were evasive, there's no 'who we are' section on their website. They have some MPs listed as 'supporters' but Jess Philips said 'I've been asked to speak ...' and much of what she said about tackling the gender pay gap wasn't about the EA at all. She said we've just voted to allow parliament to repeal the EA at any moment (Brexit related). In the face of that, all suggestions to add characteristics and tweak it every 3 years is just rearranging the deckchairs. Jess came across as a (very good) invited speaker, rather than a member of this group.

They're talking about recruiting 100 MPs to support a change in the law - that the EA is reviewed every 3 years. They're talking about launching a public consultation.

What mandate do they have and who gave it to them?

Who are they?

We need transparency.

The only speaker that was completely 'on message' with this group's stated aims (aside from the chair whose name we don't know) was Afzal Khan who, along with Wes Streeting, is a member of the APPG on British Muslims.

Yes, a bit of a mystery.
Did you note who the woman was who said she was representing 80 charities Pencils?

She left saying she has to pick up her kids.

I’m not sure about caste as a PC, surely this is also something, like homelessness, that should be eradicated?

Thank you to all the women who took time out of their schedules to go see what this was and just generally being active. I'm in Italy, bit If I can ever help with anything remotely, even translation work, let me know. You are all an inspiration.

Protecting something can lead to the eradication can't it. If caste has to be invisible in decision making then it becomes powerless.

Not worded terribly well, hope you can see my point. It is a tool in the kit.

The meeting didn't quite go the way the organisers planned.

Surely the point of protected characteristics is eradication?

Eradication of discrimination.

Homeless people are discriminated against widely in the provision of services, housing, jobs, health etc etc

There is a massive need to eradicate that discrimination just as there is any type of discrimination.

Homeless people are arguably the most vulnerable group in the UK and they suffer a huge amount of discrimination.

Likewise with poverty. You may have noticed that being poor means all kinds of things actually cost more than when you are rich. Poor people are discriminated against in public positions, in jobs, in housing etc etc There is definitely scope for provisions to be made to curtail practices like this, surely the EA is the appropriate vehicle?

There’s nothing wrong with reviewing laws particularly if they are as wide reasoning as the equality act. I’m afraid that no rights are ever set in stone and, if for example, the Jessica James case goes her way then the Labour Party will be wanting to rewrite the AWS section.

Equally the Tara Hudson case may go against the MoJ. And the government decides it doesn’t like the new precedent that is set.

Case law changes the application of the law and then sometimes in response the statute is changed.

Public consultation is sensible as a policy particularly as government has now been granted Henry VIII powers to make/change laws without scrutiny.

A note of caution: building allegiances is vital. These people have a slightly different agenda, it’s not necessarily sinister at all; they have grievances too or they wouldn’t have bothered to set up the event.

Not every injustice can or should be tackled via the EA.

Homelessness is not a characteristic of a person, it's something shit that happens to some people (often because of an actual protected characteristic). Unfair practices in housing are far better, and more easily tackled under housing law. Let's make it illegal for buy to let mortgage and insurance providers to have a 'no DSS' clause for a start.

We have Electricity and Gas Acts that are supposed to prevent unfair practice in the energy market. It's far easier to use the clear (and free) pathway through complaints procedures and ombudsman services, than it would be to try to bring a discrimination case on a new PC of 'poverty' (something else which is not a characteristic of a person but a shit thing that happens to people, frequently because of an actual protected characteristic).

Etc.

It's far easier to send a template letter based on these sorts of laws - such and such Act says you must do A where in fact you have done B - than it is to bring an equality case.

If that fails, you can then look at how a policy might be discriminatory to people with existing protected characteristics - has a local authority failed to meet its Public Sector Equality Duty, for example.

Does the 'hostile environment' amount to indirect race discrimination? JCWI think so and are pursuing legal action against the government on these grounds, without having to add 'undocumented migrant' to the list of PCs (which would fail to protect a fuckton of people in the UK legally who are disadvantaged because their documentation is not a British passport).

Does Universal Credit discriminate against disabled people? The High Court has decided it does, at least in the case of people who have lost income when they have 'naturally migrated' from ESA. We don't need to add 'poverty' as a PC to do this. Poverty is not a characteristic of a person. In this case, poverty is caused by the way the government treat people with the protected characteristic of disability.

Equality law is made of big overarching principles and each case must be argued on its own merits. In a sense, every equality case is a test case. There are no template letters you can send. You're likely to need expert lawyers and there are very few things you can get legal aid for these days. It's a last resort in most cases because most people need things put right as quickly and cheaply as possible. Especially people affected by poverty, homelessness etc. They don't have time for that shit.

So this whole 'add more PCs to the EA' thing* seems like pointless feel-good virtue signalling. It's just adding more oppression top-trump cards to the pack and will make no practical difference at all to people who are actually on the pooey end of discrimination.

*With the exception of caste - it's a no brainer to add this to the definition of race and it wouldn't be difficult at all.

Did you note who the woman was who said she was representing 80 charities Pencils?

I think it was Ellie Harris from Equality & Diversity Forum.

This thread has put a massive smile on my face, well done and round of applause. Go team!

I don't trust this group as far as I can spit.

They've been asked repeatedly who they are and what mandate they have and they have evaded the questions every time.

The driving force appears to be Wes Streeting who has engaged in nasty victimising behaviour against women who are attempting to secure their rights to parliamentary representation, as women, through AWS, as specifically allowed in the Equality Act.

I'm all in favour of political alliances where useful and not detrimental to either side. Political alliance is not the same as being allies. Allies are on the same side. Political alliance is useful to both sides where aims happen to align, even where there may be huge areas of disagreement.

That's only possible with total transparency and an open acknowledgement of differences.

Fair enough

Kudos for doing the heavy lifting

And as a principle we shouldn't be protecting poverty or homelessness for similar reasons that we shouldn't be protecting gender.

These are the effects of discrimination. They should be got rid of, not protected in law.

It's the same line of argument that leads to 'sex workers' rights' with no analysis of why vast numbers of women and girls are bought and sold and abused, and no attempt to stop it because 'sex workers' rights'.

I've been poor, I've been homeless. These are conditions I managed to escape. They were never 'characteristics' of me as a person.

Go and ask poor and homeless people if they'd like their hardship 'protected' in law, or if they'd just prefer not to be poor or homeless.

Religion is not a ‘characteristic’ either. Neither is belief.

The point of protecting characteristics is not only to provide a claim in court but to force monitoring and change practices.

I also find the sneering re objections to prevent objectionable BTW. The people at the meeting may have been objectionable and sexist but prevent is a terrible program, the way it is at the moment, which is known to be a factor in radicalisation.

I have problems with prevent. I don't think amending the equality act is a helpful way to deal with that. The need is to campaign against prevent. Race and religion are already protected characteristics. If the equality act isn't working it's not because it doesn't cover this stuff, it's because it's almost impossible to enforce.

Adding more characteristics isn't going to change that.

Thanks for the name Pencils. She was the woman who said gender is the correct word, not sex.

I'm not sure what I think about prevent. I've heard mixed opinions. I don't know enough about it to write off the whole strategy as doing more harm than good, but there are definitely issues.

This radio 4 podcast is interesting. Perhaps like so many things, it's all in the implementation?

There is a discrimination case discussed in that programme. It was successful. The law is already there for anyone who can afford to use it (IIRC this particular case was supported by Liberty).

Offred I don't think monitoring of PCs is forced as such. There's the public sector equality duty which says any organisation performing a public function has to pro-actively advance equality. Monitoring is obviously going to help them do that - and to show they are doing that - but as far as I know it's not a legal obligation. We just got mandatory reporting of the gender pay gap and there was the suggestion in the meeting that this should be done across other PCs too.

There is already a lot of monitoring of socioeconomic inequality without poverty being added as a PC. There's also Part 1 of the EA which is the public sector duty regarding socioeconomic inequality.

This section requires specified public bodies, when making strategic decisions such as deciding priorities and setting objectives, to consider how their decisions might help to reduce the inequalities associated with socio-economic disadvantage. Such inequalities could include inequalities in education, health, housing, crime rates, or other matters associated with socio-economic disadvantage. It is for public bodies subject to the duty to determine which socio-economic inequalities they are in a position to influence.

It's carefully written in that individuals cannot bring private discrimination cases under this duty, although they can seek judicial review if they believe a public org has not considered socioeconomic disadvantage when making strategic decisions.

It took a lot of effort to push the Equality Act through Parliament. It is a big piece of legislation with many (often competing) interest groups. I doubt there's an appetite for a review.

Update!

Three years on, this strange group say they have 'conducted the largest and most comprehensive review of the Equality Act in its 10 year history.' and we can look forward to the launch of this review in July.

twitter.com/EqualityActRev/status/1398267411858657283

About a month after the 2018 meeting that prompted this thread, the government announced a public inquiry into enforcement of the EA and the role of EHRC.

old.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/commons-select/women-and-equalities-committee/news-parliament-2017/enforcing-the-equality-act-launch-17-19/

This group do not appear to have participated in that inquiry, or to have had anything to say about it at all

It doesn't look like they did much of anything during 2019.

During 2020 they mostly focused on exam results/predicted grades during covid. They appear to have worked closely with Afzal Khan on this.

They apparently had a public consultation on review of the EA at the beginning of this year but either they deliberately kept it quiet (I think there was one tweet) or their comms are shite.

They're very interested in the views of Muslim men in the workplace.

They've belatedly added a 'who we are' page to their website -

Dr Suriyah Bi
Anisa Mahmood
Gabriela Alvarez
Claudia Mullholland

Four young women, three of whom are SOAS academics.

Coming back to their 'largest and most comprehensive review of the Equality Act in its 10 year history' - they're still banging on about homelessness and poverty being made protected characteristics and I stand by what I said three years ago about that.

Also haXXor totally nailed it on page 2:

OMG it has just hit me how they are going to do this. They will put through an "all or nothing" amendment to improve the live of the poor and the homeless and ALSO replace "sex" with "gender identity", with huge amounts of press about the poor and homeless bits and media silence on the sex bits and the impact it will have on women.

From their website:

What we aim to change

2. Addition of characteristics that are not already protected, and the modification of existing characteristics to align with the current social environment, ten years on from the writing of the initial legislation. New characteristics could include: homelessness, low socio-economic status and/or poverty, caste, immigration status, and others as appropriate; modifications could include: joining “sex” and “gender reassignment” to be one protected characteristic using gender neutral language, as well as extending the period during which pregnancy and maternity are protected. (my bold)

www.equalityactreview.co.uk/our-work

I think they're a bunch of clueless amateurs who don't have the nous to formulate a serious campaign to amend the EA. In 2018 they said they were seeking support from 100 MPs. Three years later they have 13 named MP supporters so I don't think they're a major threat. Nevertheless it may be worth keeping an eye on those named on this page:

www.equalityactreview.co.uk/uk-members-of-parliament