Equality Act 

Summary

The Equality Act established a single Equality and Human Rights Commission (replacing the three existing commissions).  It also introduced a positive Gender Equality Duty on public sector bodies to promote equality of opportunity between women and men, and eliminate sex discrimination.

What employers must do

Specific duties have been introduced to help public authorities in planning, delivering and evaluating their activities to meet the general duty, and to report on those activities.

The specific duties require organisations to:

• prepare and publish a gender equality scheme (GES) showing how they intend to fulfil the duties and setting out gender equality objectives
• prepare the GES in consultation with employees, service users and others including trade unions, to take into account any relevant information gathered about how their policies and practices affect gender equality
• consider the need for overall objectives to address the causes of any gender pay gaps
• implement the GES and any actions for gathering and using information, within the three year life of the scheme
• review and revise the GES at least every three years and report annually on progress.

The GES also needs to set out the actions the organisation has taken or intends to take to:

• gather information on the effect of its policies and practices on men and women, in employment, services and performance of its functions
• use the information to review the implementation of the scheme objectives
• assess the impact of its current and future policies and practices on gender equality
• consult relevant employees, service users and others (including trade unions)
• ensure implementation of the scheme objectives.

Implications

Health providers must think about the policies they develop and services they deliver, with the different needs of women and men in mind.  They also need to look at who uses their services and consider questions like:

• What are the different issues and priorities for women and men who use our services?
• Do they have different requirements and needs?
• Will women or men be put off using a service e.g. the lack of childcare or an unsafe or unwelcoming environment?
• Are there some services which are more effectively delivered as women-only or men-only ones?

NHS organisations must also look at their employment policies to see how they affect women and men. Gender considerations may include:

• Is there a pay gap between men and women doing the same job or jobs of similar value?
• How could flexible working help staff and how will it benefit men and women?
• How do we recruit staff and are we likely to get a good gender balance of candidates?
• Do we have a gender imbalance? If so, how could we try and rectify this?
• Do we have a good rate of returners from maternity leave? If not, why, and how can we improve this?

Further information

To support employers in preparing for the Equality duty, we have produced online guidance material which includes:

• An overview of the Gender Equality Duty and a step-by-step guide to producing a Gender Equality Scheme
• A Department of Health presentation 'Creating a Gender Equality Scheme - key facts and actions for NHS organisations'.