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Equality Act (2010)
(Source: Government Equalities Office)
The Equality Act (2010) brings together nine separate pieces of legislation (including the Disability Discrimination Acts 1995 and 2005) into one single Act, simplifying the law and strengthening it in important ways to help tackle discrimination and inequality.
Implementation of majority of the Equality Act will begin from 1 October 2010.
The Government Equalities Office has produced a series of summary guides and ‘Quick Start’ guides to the key changes in the law, in partnership with organisations including the British Chambers of Commerce, Citizens Advice and the Equality and Diversity Forum. These simple guides set out clearly what the new laws will mean for business, the public sector, the voluntary sector and the public, helping people understand their new responsibilities and rights.
- Equality Act 2010: What do I need to know? A summary guide to your rights
- DEDDF CYDRADDOLDEB 2010: BETH SYDD ANGEN I MI EI WYBOD? CANLLAW CRYNO I’CH HAWLIAU (Welsh)
- Equality Act 2010: What do I need to know? A summary guide for voluntary and community sector service providers
- Equality Act 2010: What do I need to know? A summary guide for public sector organisations
- Equality Act 2010: What do I need to know? A summary guide for businesses who sell goods and services
- Acas guide on The Equality Act – what’s new for employers?
- Equality Act 2010: What do I need to know? Disability quick start guide
- Equality Act 2010: What do I need to know as a Carer?
- Equality Act 2010: What do I need to know? Quick-start guide for businesses who sell goods and services
WHAT DO YOU NEED TO KNOW?
Here are the main areas where the law has been made stronger from October 2010. Remember that not all the changes in the Equality Act will start at the same time. So if you think you might be covered by the new law, you’ll need to get advice about whether it has come in to force yet. You can get advice about whether the law has come in to force yet from your local Citizens Advice Bureau, or look on the Citizens Advice website at: www.adviceguide.org.uk.
If you’re discriminated against because you’re disabled, the new law could help you.
For example, there will be a slightly different test of what ‘disability’ means. When the new law comes in, it will be easier for someone to show that they have difficulty carrying out their day-to-day activities, and therefore that they come under the definition of ‘disabled person’ and are protected under the Act.
Another way the new law could help you if you are disabled is that for the first time, the law protects you from ‘indirect discrimination’. This is where a policy or practice is applied in the same way to everyone, but it puts disabled people at a particular disadvantage. However, it doesn’t count as indirect discrimination if the person applying the policy can justify it.
Example: Your employer brings in a new shift pattern which means that everyone has to work fewer days, but longer days. You have a disability that means you’re exhausted after two long days of working. So the new shift pattern puts you and other people who have the same disability as you at a disadvantage. Your employer will have indirectly
discriminated against you if it can’t justify the new shift pattern.
When the new law comes in, it will be easier for you to make a claim for discrimination that happens because of something connected with your disability. It will count as ‘unlawful discrimination’ if someone who knows you are disabled treats you unfavourably because of something that results from your disability, provided that treatment can’t be justified.
This is called ‘discrimination arising from a disability’.
Example: Because of your disability, you might need to take more leave from work than
people you work with. Your employer must not treat you unfavourably because you are off work, as long as it knows that you have a disability. However, your employer may be able to justify anything it does, and if its action can be justified then, it won’t be against the law.
Here are some more examples of how the Equality Act may help you if you’re disabled:
• Employers will generally no longer be allowed to ask questions about health or disability before they offer you a job or before they include you in a pool of people to be offered a job when a vacancy arises. However, they can ask you such questions if they have a good reason. (See Workplace guidance for more details).
• If you’re at a substantial disadvantage when compared with someone who isn’t disabled, reasonable changes (‘adjustments’) must be made by your employer or by someone providing goods or services. They may have to change the way things are done, or make changes to a building, or provide aids such as special computer software to help you do your job. Reasonable adjustments can also include providing information in an accessible format.
The new law makes it clear that when receiving services you can’t be asked to pay the costs of making these reasonable adjustments.
Equal Opportunity Employers
