Outline Of Equality Act Essay - Discussion & Implications.

Summarize the Equality Act

Discuss about the Outline Of Equality Act Act 2010.

The report will discuss in detail about the Equality Act which actually came in action in October, 2010. For this, I am going to bring focus of Managing Director to outline about the Equality Act and the relevant potential implications which are set upon the organisations. I feel that the act can bring together over hundred and sixteen distinct pieces based on legislation into one act which is combined with the new Act. It will, thereby, provide a legal foundation with framework to save the rights of people and advances with equality of options for everyone (Manthorpe and Moriarty, 2014). The act is very simple which is formed to strengthens as well as create harmony the present legislation to provide UK with a new kind of discrimination law which saves people from unfair practice and advertising a fair and more equal setup in the society.

To administer about the different Acts, following are the nine important pieces of legislation that have combined are discussed in detail below: -

1. The Equal Pay Act 1970
2. The Race Relations Act 1976
3. The Sex Discrimination Act 1976
4. The Employment Equality Regulation 2003
5. The Disability Discrimination Act 1995
6. The Equality Act (Sexual Orientation) Regulations 2007
7. The Employment Equality Regulation 2003
8. The Equality Act 2006 (Part 2)
9. The Employment Equality Regulations 2006

According to me, the Equality Act 2010, is about treatment given equal to the people without any discrimination. For the Managing Director, it is important to know that the case of equality act will help in providing a constant or explicit form. Here, there are many people who are non-discriminants that are working on saving or protecting the community of the LGBTQ people across important areas of life consisting housing, employment, credit based education, federally associated funded program and jury related services.

It has been highlighted that the Act includes the case of disability, employers and the service providers where the people are under the duty to make all the types of reasonable adjustments. With this, it will bring the change to the law on succession with the complex undertaking that involves the amendment or repeal of the different number of items. (Ferreira et al., 2016). The Equality Act follows certain cases which needs to be taken care of:

1. The duty is for the reasonable adjustments for the common parts that are of leasehold and commonhold premises.
2. The provisions are related to auxiliary aids in schools and diversity reporting by the political parties.
3. The provisions are about the access for tax and working over the prohibition standards with age discrimination on services and public functions.

There are certain elements of the Act which does not come to force, and I feel that the Managing Director should have a clear idea about the same.

1. The dual discrimination: The government thinks it as a way of reducing a cost of regulation to the business and according to me it will help the organisation build up in a better manner without discrimination.
2. The socio-economic inequalities are mainly under the Public-Sector Equality Duty as well.

According to me, the Discrimination law is about how the people are treated differently for the sex, caste, creed colour etc. With regards to this, there is a major discrimination on the sexual orientation that has undergone the gender reassignment. For the Managing Director, I would live to hover on the Discrimination which could occur mainly based on the perceptions of person’s religion and beliefs. The extension is to the different association with restrictions to the particular religion or belief. It is based on the sexual orientation that applies to the sexual orientation for the people of same sex, different or both the sex. The employees are paid for the different rates rather than working mainly because of the sex. The new act covered many diverse areas like disability, race, sex and many more features of discrimination that exist within one single piece of legislation and also made transformation to the current law. Usually it does not get applied on the Northern Ireland. There is distinct page on the Equality Act 2010 (Davies et al., 2016). It has been seen that Equality Act also consist of some important transformation to disability based discrimination law in comparison with the pre-2010 position. This will be helpful for me to highlight about the disability Act of Discrimination 1995.

Outline the changes made from previous Discrimination Law

On discussion with the people and their thoughts about the Act, the Discrimination Law and the Equality Act 2010, should be taken hold of. The Managing Director should focus on working with proper recruitment, training and the dismissal procedures. There are companies who fire the disabled people. (Wintemute, 2016). Following discussion is based on the important changes associated to disability discrimination law: -

1. Objective based justification test: for some kind of discrimination, the manager or the service provider etc has the defence when one can justify and how it can be treated with the disabled individual. The evaluation used before are replaced by single goals based justification test where the employer with service provider etch should show that its conduct was means of accomplishing a legitimate objective.
2. Remedy the Malcolm Case: an important decision by the House of Lords in case Malcolm vs LB Lewisham limited some of the rights to claim for any kind of disability based discrimination, but the equality act also aims to change the place back to more balanced kind of approach and it seems to have been insanely successful in performing this by giving disabled people with wider rights that are subjected to the manager etc. and also able to properly justify the conduct (Shah, 2015). This can also be accomplished by introducing the new methods for the disability based discrimination and the most crucial is known as the discrimination arising from the disability and the other indirect kind of discrimination.
3. Pre-employment doubts and questions: there is the existence of new kind of rule which is completely against the manager asking the candidate disability based questions and the rule is further subjected to more important exceptions.
4. Single equality based duty: in the year 2011, there were three distinct public-sector equality based duties that is applied to the varied public bodies. The duties also covered race along with gender and disability. In the year 2010, there is one public sector based equality duty which can also easily embrace the other grounds like religious based beliefs and sexual orientation and the race along with disability and gender. It also covers the scope however the content of the duty is transformed in places like England schemes on equality will not be needed any longer (Shah, 2015). It came into action in April 2011 for the sake of general public-sector duty however at later stage in England and other place like Scotland for the particular duties.
5. Discrimination by perception: there is direct kind of discrimination which is based on the assumed or perceived disability to made some unlawful or cases for employment which possibly are highly unlawful. This further may also help a claimant when for instance, a manager argued that the impact of any kind of impairment or normal day-to-day function are not crucial or substantial. The manager can also be liable even when the effect is not major and on the basis, it was first perceived as a part of disability (Roberts, 2013).
6. Discrimination on the basis of association: the direct kind of discrimination or any kind of harassment when based on the association which is made unlawful or in the case of employment is unacceptable and unlawful clearly. This leads to application on for instance, where a friend of a person with disability is harassed. The transformation executes a European Court based decision in Coleman v Attridge Law. However, it also goes way beyond a point.
7. Treatment with disabled person is more favourably: treatment of a disabled person which is more favourable and it was not completely stopped by the cases of disability based discrimination act in 1995. But the right to perform this can be limited by the Equality Act. In broader terms, it is still very lawful under the Equality Act to deal with disabled people in general with more favourably than any non-disabled individual. However, it may be that one which cannot deal with people with more specific impairment unless it is permitted by some specific provision in the Equality Act (Roberts and Hou, 2016).

Following are the potential problems:

1. Despite taking so many important steps in the right direction for LGBT group which consist of lesbian, gay, bisexual, queer and transgender, many developed countries like US lack the foundation of legal protection is many states across the nation. This patchwork and the associated nature of the present law leaves so many people that are subject to many kinds of uncertainty and potential level discrimination that can influence the safety and the family as well as the way of life. The country’s civil rights based laws also protect people which are based on race, colour and national level origin and in many cases, it covers disability and religion. However, the federal law does not completely provide the constant non-discrimination based protection on sexual orientation or gender based identity. There is also a need for such protection and it is quite clear since approx. two-third of the community of LGBTQ US based residents are reporting the discrimination in the personal lives (Hand, 2016). It is also important that everyone needs a fair chance to earn more for the living and further provide a home for the families without any fear of harassment or discriminations. There are number of nonpartisan public religious research institute also called as (PRRI) that have founded that the nationality further supports for a bill which is like the Equality Act topped seventy percent which consist of a major Democrats, independents and Republicans. Moreover, there is a strong support for business for many non-discriminant protections for the community of LGBTQ. The present legislation has further endorsed by the Business Coalition for the sake of Equality Act and a group of more than ninety major organization with function in every fifty states, employing more than five million people in US and a total revenue of more two trillion dollars (Hand, 2016).
2. Can a manager need an employee to divorce to keep the job? Pendleton vs. Derbyshire Country Council and another (EAT): the case was considered as one of most controversial based employment decisions of the year 2016 and the EAT held that dismissing the teacher who also happens to be a Christian since there is a refusal to end the marriage with the convict who is a sex offender was religious discrimination. The EAT most surprisingly advised that an individual of some kind of faith who also believed in the safety of marriage can also be placed at a specific drawback when the employer needs him or her to end the association of marriage with a convict who is convicted for sex offense (Hand, 2016). This is taken as a last case of employment in which a manager has to weigh up whether or not to completely dismiss an innocent person who work with the children since the third part is doing wrong.
3. Misconduct dismissal to pull a sickie. A case of Metroline West Ltd. vs Ajaj (EAT): the case never says anything that can be seasoned the professionals of HR that will not know already related to dealing with malingering the image of the workforce. But the case also provides more valuable kind of recap for the managers that are suspecting the workforce who is faking the diseases (Hand and Feast, 2017). The EAT further assures that the workforce who make up or in case exaggerates the impact of, an illness to take any kind of fraudulent sick leaves is basically breaching along with implied word based on trust or confidence and can further be dismissed.
4. Immigration status never matched with the nationality: the case Onu vs Akiwiwu; Olaigbe vs Taiwo and other cases: there is a huge reach of race based discrimination related laws that has been part of lively employment las that also issues in last some years. For instance, it is also accepted that caste of somebody does come within the description of the race under the act. But the supreme court in Onu also shied away from extension from the definition (Authority, 2017). The Supreme Court also held that any kind of mistreatment of two current migrant employees based on the immigration status dis not amount to race based discrimination.
5. Mangers must take proactive step to encourage rest breaks: Grange vs Abellio London Ltd. (EAT): the working time case further evaluate the overall scope of the crucial rights for the employees to take the break for rest. The case specifically asked for the worker need to ask for the break and be also refused right before the individual can bring the overall working time claimed in the employment based tribunal. The EAT further made it clearer that the manager have the proactive duty to make sure that the employees are able to take a break of twenty minutes completely uninterrupted rest break for every six hours (Authority, 2017).
6. Reasonable adjustment with pay protection. G4S Cash Solutions vs Powell (EAT): how pay can be impacted when the disabled employee is moved to a new kind of role since the person is unable to continue with the old role. In case of Powell, an engineer in maintenance department developed back issues as well as retain his current set of terms as well as conditions, however moved to the lesser position. But the dispute surfaced when the manager said it would only role since it was designed temporary in case he agrees to the reduction in the pay.
7. The case where EAT restricts the scope of Acas discipline and the grievances code: the case of Acas code of practices was based on disciplinary and grievance process which also applied where the manager is disciplining the workforce for the misconduct or bad performance (Lane and Parkes, 2014). However, the application of code of the company was unclear since the reason for the main action actually falls within for some other important reason for dismissal. For instance, when an employee is dismissed since there is a breakdown which is working as per the relationships.
8. Inclusion of commission in holiday pay. The case of British Gas Trading Ltd vs Locj and another based on the Court of Appeal: the case also covers the cases of Sobczyszyn vs Szhola Podstawowa W Rzeplinie (ECJ): no kind of employment in law year will be complete in itself without a case associated with the calculation of the holiday pay. In other cases, like Lock, the Court of Appeal actually followed the trend in the present time by agreeing to the holiday pay which should be included more than just the base pay (Lane and Parkes, 2014).
9. Vouchers of childcare at the time of maternity leave: Peninsula Business Services Ltd vs Donaldson (EAT). This decision further backed in the month March needed the manager to evaluate how the childcare vouchers scheme handles the maternity leave. The HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) further advices that in traditional manner which can be unlawful for the manger to make any kind of suspension of childcare voucher scheme based on membership at the time of maternity leave a much-needed requirement for joining. The case in Peninsula where the childcare voucher scheme was subjected to a legal challenge since the scheme needed the employees to actually agree to suspend the membership at the time of maternity leave (Lane and Parkes, 2014).
10. First tribunal based decision on the sharing of the parental leave: the case of Snell vs Network Rail: it was a bigger deal in case of excitement and trepidation among many HR professional when the news in October of first employment law decision came out on shared parental leaves. When this concept was introduced, one of the biggest concern was how much the manager can increase the level of maternity pay and must part those on shared pay in the case. The common agreement was that the managers that increases the pay in case of maternity however not share parental pay can take a risk of sex discrimination claim. The network rail when one step ahead by distinguishing between the mother as well as the partner in the current provision of increased shared parental pay (Lane and Parkes, 2014).

Under the Equality Act, I would like to recommend some measures that will benefit the wider scope for employees, even when it is no longer important for the single claims. This can actually happen where the employer has completely left the employer. But the new power was also surfaced and repealed from 2015. According to me, there are claims for direct kind of discrimination on two combined cases however not more than two can be expressed or allowed for example discrimination from a disabled woman (Shah, 2016). But this kind of provision is not going to be brought into picture for a very long time.

Liability for harassment by consumer etc.

In some cases, the Equality Act also made the manager liable when the staff was being harassed by the third parties, like when the customers or the suppliers. But this was subsequently repealed from 2013 (Shah, 2016).

There were cases of auxiliary aids which is reasonable adjustment for the schools: the schools and LEAs have a new set of duty to give an auxiliary aid as well as serviced whenever it is reasonable.

There are many kinds of changed to the law that were proposed since it did not find the way into the act of Equality. This is considered as the important source for recommending which in many cases go completely beyond the Act in the year 2009 report based on Work and Pension Committee. Following are some important recommendation which are specifically crucial: -

1. Great extension of legal definition of disability: places like House of Commons Work along with Pensions Committee has renewed the calls for saving to extend to every person who has an impairment without needed impact of the impairment to be crucial or long term in existence (Shah, 2016).
2. Equality Tribunals: then it is also important to address the present challenges or difficulties in brining any kind of discrimination based claims on provision of services, the Work and Pensions Committee as recommended the concept of Equality Tribunals which will address with both employment based claims as well as services based claims (Shah, 2016).

References

Authority, S.Q., 2017. Section 96 (7) Equality Act 2010.

Davies, C., Ferreira, N., Morris, A. and Morris, D., 2016. The Equality Act 2010: Five years on.

Ferreira, N., Davies, C., Morris, A. and Morris, D., 2016. Editorial–the Equality Act 2010: Five Years on.

Hand, J. and Feast, P., 2017. Enigmas of the Equality Act 2010—“Three uneasy pieces” Cogent Social Sciences Management(2015), 1: 1123085 https://dx. doi. org/10.1080/23311886.2015. 1123085.

Hand, J.A., 2016. An analysis of aspects of the Equality Act 2010.

Lane, J. and Parkes, B., 2014. Nursery Management: The Equality Act 2010-Acting to end discrimination. Nursery World.

Manthorpe, J. and Moriarty, J., 2014. Examining day centre provision for older people in the UK using the Equality Act 2010: Findings of a scoping review. Health & social care in the community, 22(4), pp.352-360.

Roberts, P. and Hou, E., 2016. The best education money can buy? Disabled university students and the Equality Act 2010. International Journal of Discrimination and the Law, 16(2-3), pp.143-160.

Roberts, P.I., 2013. School Exclusion in England and Wales and the Equality Act 2010: the challenge of disability-related behaviour.

Shah, P., 2015. Against Caste in British Law: A Critical Perspective on the Caste Discrimination Provision in the Equality Act 2010. Springer.

Shah, P., 2016. What lies behind the inclusion of caste in the UK Equality Act?. Religion and the public Sphere.

Wintemute, R., 2016. Goodbye EU Anti-Discrimination Law? Hello Repeal of the Equality Act 2010?. King's Law Journal, 27(3), pp.387-397.