Nottingham Council thinks pregnancy isn’t a protected characteristic but paternity is

[LoobiJee]

Thought this might merit its own thread, for any Nottingham residents.

Nottingham Council’s EDI Strategy (pg 5) lists “maternity and paternity” as the protected characteristic instead of the actual EA2010 protected characteristic which is “pregnancy and maternity”.

www.nottinghamcity.gov.uk/media/3374624/ncc-edi-strategy-2020-23.pdf

He would have try to argue that he had been subjected to either direct or indirect sex discrimination under EA2010.

For example, if all the women who had taken maternity leave had been given a promotion on their return from their maternity leave but none of the men had been given a promotion on return from their two weeks paternity leave.

Or if all of the women who always leave work on time to pick up their kids had been given a promotion but none of the men who always leave work on time to pick up their kids had been given a promotion.

If men want to present the case for fatherhood being added to the list of legally protected characteristics then they are welcome to do so, and - depending on how sound their arguments are - I might support them. I think it's up to them to put in the spadework though, not feminists.

The protected characteristic is pregnancy and maternity, so no, that protected characteristic doesn’t cover males because males don’t get pregnant and give birth.

What is interesting about Nottingham Council’s decision to misrepresent this particular protected characteristic, and only this protected characteristic, is that it is the only protected characteristic which does not apply to both sexes.

Strictly speaking, it isn’t motherhood that’s the protected characteristic, it’s maternity. Which I think the guidance sets a time limit on. I came across this when researching the protection against discrimination for breastfeeding mothers, and the government at the time relied on EA2010 to say that breastfeeding mothers are protected from discrimination in law, so that they wouldn’t have to bring in specific legislation to provide that protection.

So “fatherhood” wouldn’t be the/an equivalent protected characteristic to “maternity”.

To argue for the necessity for a protected characteristic (other than, ‘wah! not fair!’), there would be a need to come up with something more narrowly defined than “having offspring”. Maybe something around the sleep deprivation early days? But other than that it’s not obvious what the material difference would be between man with baby offspring / man with toddler offspring / man with teenage offspring / man with no offspring to justify discrimination protection legislation.

Sorry got a bit convoluted there, feeling tired today.

Just to add, if “having offspring” were - in effect - to be a protected characteristic, then it would be very difficult to argue that “having caring responsibilities” shouldn’t be.

But that would get into quite a different debate though, at that point. About the nature of the PCs - which are essentially individual personal characteristics (age, sex, race, disability) currently - instead moving into the field of domestic/ social situations.

Perhaps the incorrect PC in that strategy document is someone at Nottingham Council trying to make the case for men to be treated as if having a pregnant partner is no different from actually being pregnant. Perhaps someone in Nottingham Council thinks it’s an outrage if female employees get time off for ante natal appointments and male employees don’t. I guess that’s as plausible as being too lazy to look up EA2010.

What is interesting about Nottingham Council’s decision to misrepresent this particular protected characteristic, and only this protected characteristic, is that it is the only protected characteristic which does not apply to both sexes.

That.

There is an increasing discomfort and unwillingness to mention that there is a sex class that has biological and reproductive needs that the other sex class does not have, and that there are legal protections. Sex based rights.

It's a political discomfort about pandering to one of those sex classes. Clue: it's not the sex with sex based needs being pandered to. Measures to balance inequality and access for females are being removed because of political male-centric agendas.

The government are going to need to put their foot down about this, and insist it's the law and not 'here's a version of the law we re wrote until we all liked it better'.

Thank you for the explanation LoobiJee

Yes, thanks LoobiJee, I think that has clarified it.

Agree with Floisme that it is for men to make the case for this if they want it. I think this may well happen.

You’re welcome. 👍

Have just had a look at my Council'a EDI policy and am surprised but pleased that (despite being in Scotland where our Government is captured) it states the correct characteristics and actually talks about sex inequalities.

I looked at mine and it talks about the need to balance rights

What fuckwit wrote that???

Please excuse me while I draft my letter of complaint to Nottingham. Anyone else joining me?

Seen this? Promoting adoption is a good thing, of course. Myth busting is a useful part of doing that. But FFS Nottingham what's missing from the list?

twitter.com/MyNottingham/status/1542059543227670530?s=20&t=Fh2zwVM8v96HMKiMDl01AQ

For people avoiding twitter links, the full text is:

The following are NOT barriers to being able to adopt:

 your marital status
 your sexual orientation
 your gender identity
 your religion
 your ethnicity
 your employment status
 whether you're disabled
 whether you own your home or not

PMd you op

I was a member of Nottingham Resisters a while back and I thought this was one document that was looked at and found to be ok.

<Waves if you are reading>

Just shows you have to be on the ball and keep bloody checking.

Some gender identities should be a barrier to adoption

The only question should be whether the prospective adoptive parent(s) have the ability and will to prioritise the child's physical mental and emotional health even if the going gets tough.

And we've seen repeatedly on these boards how hard a judgment this is.

If you’ve got information to share, I suggest you post it in this thread.

I've seen it repeatedly on MN (often on dreaded parent and child parking spaces threads) where women are dismissed as 'why should you get rights just because you squeezed a baby out?' Completely overlooking the impact of pregnancy on women's bodies, birth trauma, or the vulnerability of babies and small children. The attitude to pregnancy is becoming increasingly dismissive.

It is because they are trying to normalise surrogacy. Because it infringes on men's rights not to be in control.

This is not a bug, it's a feature.

I don't think it is about normalising surrogacy (though it may be helpful for that so those with that interest would push it). I think trivialising pregnancy and care of small babies it a wider issue that also brings in things like minimising rape and access to abortions. It is misogyny at its purest.

I checked the policies of my local council (Lambeth)

"gender identity (referred to as gender reassignment in the Act)"

Sorry. Gender reassignment and gender identity are two different things. You can't just reword legislation.

They do say "In Lambeth, we also recognise socio-economic status; health and, speaking English as an additional language (EAL) as protected characteristics." so they could equally say that in Lambeth they recognise gender identity as well as gender reassignment, rather than suggest that Stonewall Law rules.

Lambeth can do all the “recognising” they want. It won’t give people who are poor or people with EAL legal protection from discrimination in the provision of goods and services under EA2010. Residents won’t be able to take them to court because of it.

However if those people with EAL or those people who are poor happen to be black, Asian, minority ethnic, then the protected characteristic of race would give them such protection under EA2010 if they were being discriminated against on grounds of their race.

It makes you wonder whether councils actually understand equality legislation. And hope that they’ve got a better understanding of the statutory duties in education, social care housing etc.