Gino Meriano gay rights campaigner comments “Over the coming months we will see a potential new Bill come into affect that will add additional protection to our community. It has been one of the most talked about Bill’s over the last year and no doubt still be challenged if/when passed. For those interested the strands will move from 7 to 9 and include marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity. We have a long way to go even with this Bill but it would seem 2010 is going to present itself as a good start for social inclusion”.

Latest news on the Bill

During second reading of the Bill on 15 December, a wide-ranging discussion took place on issues including the appropriate measures for protecting against discrimination.

Committee stage – line by line examination of the Bill – begins on 11 January.

Summary of the Bill

The Bill will harmonise and in some cases extend existing discrimination law covering the ‘protected characteristics’ of age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, sex, and sexual orientation. It will address the impact of recent case law which is generally seen as having weakened discrimination protection, and harmonise provisions defining indirect discrimination.

Key areas

• Provides powers to extend age discrimination protection outside the workplace
• Clarifies protection against discrimination by association, for example in relation to a mother who cares for her disabled child
• Extends protection from discrimination on the grounds of gender reassignment to school pupils
• Extends discrimination protection in the terms of membership and benefits for private clubs and associations
• Creates a unified public sector duty, intended to promote equality in public policy and decision-making, existing provisions being extended to the protected characteristics of sexual orientation, age and religion or belief, and proposes a new public sector duty related to socio-economic inequalities
• Provides for legislation requiring that employers review gender pay differences within their organisations and publish the results
• Provides for changes to the way that individual claims are enforced, and gives employment tribunals wider powers to make recommendations for the collective benefit of employees
• Allows a Minister to amend UK equality legislation to comply with European law without the need for primary legislation
• Extends the period for which all-women shortlists may be used for parliamentary and other elections until 2030 and allows parties to reserve places on shortlists of candidates for people on the grounds of race or disability.