Equality Act arrives

The Equality Act came into force in October 2010. It makes some important changes to the law on discrimination and you might have to change some of your procedures – particularly when recruiting staff. Please read on for an overview of the Equality Act, and see our FAQ's and tutorials for further information.

What does the Equality Act do?

The Equality Act 2010 has two main aims:

1. To consolidate the various pieces of anti-discrimination law into one place; and
2. To strengthen the law to improve progress on equality.

All the different forms of discrimination - which include sex, race, disability, age, sexual orientation and religion and belief - will remain distinct areas as now, and each will still be defined in different ways.

To strengthen progress on equality, the Act makes some important changes. In particular, these include protection from “associative discrimination” and “perceptive discrimination” and limiting the right of employers to ask for medical information from job applicants.

As an employer, what do I need to know?

• Most anti-discrimination law will stay the same, or practically the same, as now

There are no new strands of discrimination in the Equality Act, so discriminating on the grounds of race, sex, age, disability, sexual orientation and religion or belief, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity and gender reassignment remain unlawful, but they are all brought together in a single Act of parliament.

• It will become unlawful to ask medical questions before offering a person a job, except for certain limited reasons

To give additional protection from discrimination to disabled job applicants, and those with a family history of illness, employers will not be permitted to ask job applicants for medical information before offering them a job.

Lawful reasons to ask for medical information include complying with disability discrimination law when making interview arrangements and a genuine, job-related reason.

• Make sure you understand how you can avoid discriminating against people through “associative discrimination”

“Associative Discrimination” is where you treat someone less favourably because of someone they are associated with.

A good example is treating an employee less favourably because they have to care for a disabled relative – this would be associative disability discrimination.

• Employees can complain of harassment even if they themselves have not been harassed

Simply witnessing harassment of others will count as “harassment” under the new law.

• Customers and members of the public can complain of harassment if an employee of yours harasses them on more than two occasions

Employers will have to take reasonable steps to protect their employees from bullying and harassment by customers and clients.

What should I do now?

• Change your recruitment procedures so that you don’t ask applicants for medical information before a job offer is made.
• Existing clients should download and print out our updated guidance for your Personnel Guidance System / Managing Employees Toolkit.
• Existing clients can log on to MentorLive for detailed guidance and information, or call the Advice Line if you have any questions.
• Existing clients can also access the Equality Act e-learning module.

We have also produced some Equality Act tutorials to help you understand key themes and changes that will affect how you run your business.

To find out how NatWest Mentor can help make sure you are ready for the changes coming in if you are not already a client, please call us on 0800 634 7004, today, or fill in your details and we will call you back.