Role of CD/3rd sector

1. If Community Development is about achieving social justice for all – how can we make sure everyone benefits and contributes, regardless of protected characteristic? • How can equality practices, discrimination law and human rights be useful to us in doing this?

2. Role of CD/3rd sector • Support your authorities • Hold them to account • Getting involved in “involvement” • Providing evidence for outcome setting • Assessing impact • Making sure Councillors are aware of their own obligations in decision making • Requesting and reviewing impact assessments • Judicial review

3. The challenge of inequality • 47% of disabled people are employed. • Only 1/3 of managerial jobs held by women • Women are paid 12% less than men in full time work • Pakistani/ Bangladeshi’s have highest rates of working age illness/ disability • 1:8 LGBT people are victims of “hate crime” annually 4 • 1:3 Scots believe Eastern Europeans are taking “Scots” jobs

4. Place based policy: hard to reach or easy to ignore • Place-based policies, which focus on geographical areas of acute socio-economic deprivation, also need to be tested for potential differential impact on different equalities groups. A recent EHRC review of existing literature on place-based policies – • www.equalityhumanrights.com/scotland/research-in-scotland/-hard-to-reach-or-easy-to-ignore-a-rapid-review-of-place-based-policies-and-equality/ • Greater emphasis on the importance of carrying out equality impact assessments at the level of single outcome agreements.

5. Greater use of logic modelling by CPPs and local partnerships to reveal implicit assumptions in place-based policies and to bring out a focus on possible positive and negative impacts on equalities groups. • The need for greater awareness among policy-makers and practitioners of the evidence relating to the differential impact on equality groups and techniques to infer the impact on these groups. • Further evaluation at a local level of specific projects and approaches to engaging equalities groups and dissemination of this at a CPP and national level.

6. The Public Sector Duty • Shifting emphasis from onus on individuals to placing onus on public authorities • Mainstreaming equality into public sector culture in practical and demonstrated ways • Taking a proactive and organised approach • Tackling “institutional discrimination” • Focuses on organisational change not individual adjustments

7. General duty applies to • Public authorities when carrying out their public functions • As service providers • As policy makers • As employers • Also to services and functions which are contracted out • Also private and voluntary sector organisations which carry out public functions

8. General duty Duty to have due regard to the need to: • Eliminate discrimination, harassment, victimisation or any other prohibited conduct • Advance equality of opportunity by having due regard to • removing or minimising disadvantage • meeting the needs of particular groups that are different from the needs of others • encouraging participation in public life • Foster good relations – tackle prejudice, promote understanding

9. Outcomes • All public authorities have produced outcomes and should have involved groups and individuals in setting them • Check your authorities outcomes • Are they measurable : can you help them with this? • Can you use the outcomes set in your funding applications ? • Hold them to account on their progress reports

10. Impact assessment • Authorities must consider available evidence • No direct duty to involve groups but they must consider evidence provided to them: be pro active • They must consider mitigating actions: can you help them with that

11. Impact assessment • Very important than any assessment is available to and considered by decision makers • Results of assessments must be published: has this happened • Assessment of existing policies or practices: can you help with the prioritisation of these

12. Enforcement • General duty: Any person/organisation can apply to the Court of Session for judicial review of a public body that they felt was failing to comply. • Specific duty: Only EHRC can directly enforce. However any organisation can use failure to meet a specific duty as evidence of failure to meet the general duty

13. Judicial review • Way to challenge actions of a public body • Common in England but not used much in Scotland • Reviewing the lawfulness of a decision or action of a public body, examines the legal validity of the decision (process rather than result) • Person must have “title and interest” to raise a judicial review • Petition to the Court of Session • EHRC can intervene in cases raised by others

14. How the Framework Works • Free online tool • Eight modules, usable in any order, covering all main VCS areas of action • Suggested goals, actions and progress indicators • Users can have their own account • Accounts used to plan and track progress, set target dates, automatic reminders etc • Hope to build in capacity for users to engage with each other • Web site - ehrf.org.uk

16. Information • PSD Technical Guidance www.equalityhumanrights.com/uploaded_files/PSD/technical_guidance_on_the_public_sector_equality_duty_scotland.pdf • EHRC Scotland Report: “Counting the Cost” www.equalityhumanrights.com/scotland/projects-policies • EHRC Guide for decision-makers: Using the equality duties to make fair financial decisions www.equalityhumanrights.com/financialdecisions