Legal 4.1.4 - equality act

• Legal requirements referring to equality:

  Illegal to discriminate based on an individual's; race, age, gender, sexual orientation, religion, disability and pregnancy

  Organisations legally must make reasonable adjustments for accessibility (such as disabled toilet, or specialist equipment)
• What forms of discrimination does the equality act cover:

  Direct discrimination - Treating a person differently based on a protected characteristic

  Indirect discrimination - A policy which restricts what bathrooms people can use to registered sex

  Harassment - Unwanted behaviour that occurs because of anothers protected traits

  Victimisation - Discriminating based on an individual carrying out a protected act
• Additionally pre-employment disability and health questions are banned, excluding specific cirumstances
• The Equality Act legal protects so-called ‘positive action’.
• 'Positive action' is attempting to counteract discrimination by giving them an artificial advantage such as more advertising of stem for women and higher acceptance rates
• The main protected characteristics as per the equality act are:

  Age

  Disability

  Gender reassignment

  Marriage

  Pregnancy

  Race

  Belief

  Sex

  Sexual orientation
• The 6 main places where these are:

  When you are at work

  When using public service

  When you use services provided by a vbusiness

  When you use transport

  When you join a club or association

  WHen you contact public bodies like your local council
• The main ways to take action against disrimination are:

  Complain to your employer

  Ask for help and support

  Use employment tribunal proceedings
• An example of direct discrimination would be not training an employee on new software as they will soon retire
• An example of indirect discrimination would be a new digital system without accessibility
• An example of harassment is people, who are unable to complete their work, due to accessibility, being targeted verbally
• An example of victimisation is employees whose accessibility issues prevent them from being able to use a new digital system are the first made redundant