At the Welsh Liberal Democrat conference in Cardiff yesterday, a comfortable majority of representatives carried a motion urging that Lib Dem peers be allowed to vote with their consciences on amendment 35 of the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill. By so allowing, the party will send out the signal that our commitment to equality and human rights is undiminished despite being in coalition with a party whose commitment is at best questionable.
Amendment 35 was originally moved in the Lords by disability campaigner Baroness Jane Campbell and passed in March, supported by Labour, cross Benchers, a majority of Lib Dem peers, and a few Conservatives. Its purpose was to retain Section 3 of the Equality Act 2006, the section that gives the Equality and Human Rights Commission its purpose. Our MPs under the Government whip, voted to reject the amendment although 3 of them rebelled plus 1 Conservative. Now it returns to the Lords again.
It is to be hoped our peers (and MPs) will bear in mind that when one of the party’s national conferences has had a chance to vote on the issue, they have taken the opportunity to send a message to the leadership of “not in our name”, indicating that they are out of touch with their own grass roots members.
It would be ironic for section three to be rejected by the Lords on the twentieth anniversary of the murder of Stephen Lawrence, which is today (22 April).
* Robin is a member in Cardiff and Vale of Glamorgan
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6 Comments
Excellent article Robin. The General Duty has its’ origins in the Race Relations (Amendment) Act 2000 which emerged from the Macpherson public inquiry into Stephen’s murder by a gang of racists.
Equality experts believe that the vision of an equal Britain is of more than symbolic importance as it is an indicator of how committed the government is to equality and encapsulates the need for cultural change rather than just enforcing the law and an essential tool of modern government in diverse Britain.
This General Equality Duty represents the commitment not just of the EHRC to dedicate itself to the goal of achieving equality in reality but for the whole of Britain’s public services and Government. And the EHRC itself has declared that the General Duty should be retained.
Abolishing this mission statement sends out all the wrong signals about the Coalition’s commitment to tackling discrimination against all sections of society that experience prejudice, racism, sexism, homophobia, age discrimination and so on, and this has a knock-on effect on the reputation of our own party.
As Liberal Democrats we have our own mission statement in the preamble to our party’s constitution. As you know, this informs our philosophy and acts as a guide to our policies. It provides a common purpose and paints a vision for the kind of society we wish to see. Indeed most corporate enterprises also have a mission statement.
Britain’s foremost equalities experts, including Professor Sir Bob Hepple QC, are implacably opposed to the move to abolish the General Equality Duty. He said: “Its’ repeal will deprive those applying the law of interpretative principles and will leave equality law rudderless.”
The coalition also plan to scrap the duty on the EHRC to carry out triannual reports into discrimination and equality in British society, restricting them instead to reporting on what work they are doing.
Critics suggest that ministers want to ditch the vision statement because they lack vision themselves on the issues. The EHRC’s budget has been slashed by over 70% since 2010 and the watchdog’s powers to launch investigations into public authorities suspected of discriminating has already been removed.
The coalition now plan to axe Equality Impact Assessments, an exercise which Britain’s public authorities must do to ensure that new policies do not discriminate and that access to services is not restricted from any groups in society.
Now one of the party’s national conferences has had a chance to vote on the issue campaigners hope parliamentarians will take note of the feelings of grassroots party members.
http://www.parliament.uk/business/publications/hansard/lords/todays-lords-debates/read/unknown/515/
The House of Lords have voted by 210-180 to send Baroness Campbell’s amendment to retain Section 3 of the Equality Act back to the House of Commons for a second time.
I do hope that the Government or at least their junior partners in the coalition will allow it to stand.
A conference vote,!I sure Nick and his merry band of MP’s will take notice of that, just like the secret courts vote
Chuka Umunna has just tweeted this: Further to our calls, Equalities Minister Jo Swinson has notified me that the Govt is u-turning on it move to repeal the EHRC’s general duty.
YeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeHaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa! If that isn’t inappropriate in the context.
It looks like the elation is premature. The Government is now proposing to accept amendment 35 but to insist on amendment 36. Please see below an extra from Baroness Campbell’s speech.
“In the other place last week, the Minister told MPs: “We are also changing the commission’s monitoring duty to
ensure that it reports on its core functions, rather than on the state of society generally”.—[OfficialReport, Commons, 16/4/13; col. 217.] At present the commission is required to monitor Britain’s progress towards the aims of the general
duty. In so doing it holds up a mirror to society, as it did in its seminal report, How fair is Britain?. As the Minister indicated, if the general duty is repealed, the monitoring duty will be fundamentally changed—itwill be limited to holding up a mirror to itself and asking only, “How effective is the commission?”. This is why Amendment 35 relating to Section 3 and Amendment 36 relating to Section 12 of the Equality Act 2006 are inseparable andmust bemust be considered as one.
In other words, the Government is allowing Section 3 to stay and rendering it entirely inoperative. A very cynical measure unworthy of the Liberal Democrats in Government.