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Education and Inspections Bill

I will come to the genuine occupational requirement in a moment, when I am allowed to return to my prepared remarks. It is important that my hon. Friend and the hon. Member for Chesterfield (Paul Holmes) reflect on what I have said about schools that are not currently appointing support staff because they are appointing teachers of the faith in question to carry out exactly those pastoral functions. So I should point out that if there are concerns about advice being informed by faith, such advice is taking place at the moment, and nothing will change if it is thought that faith is informing such advice. All that we are seeking to do is to allow schools some flexibility. Our proposal conforms to the EU employment anti-discrimination directive, which was brought into law in the Employment Equality (Religion or Belief) Regulations 2003. It has always been our intention that some ““non-teaching”” roles— such as that of pastoral care—should attract this freedom. Historically, pastoral roles were carried out solely by teaching staff, and it was considered neither necessary nor desirable for the freedom to discriminate to extend to non-teaching staff. However, since the relevant provisions were enacted, work force remodelling has enabled schools to focus teachers’ attention on teaching. Pastoral and other non-teaching roles are now often more appropriately carried out by non-teaching staff. Let me now deal with the point that my hon. Friend the Member for Amber Valley (Judy Mallaber) raised a moment ago. Existing guidance specifies when the genuine occupational guidance would not apply. It states:"““A GOR cannot be claimed unless some or all of those duties, or the totality of the role, are covered by a specific exemption and an assessment has been made showing that it would be unreasonable to require other employees of the appropriate religion or belief to undertake these duties…Where the organisation has a religious ethos, a GOR exemption cannot be claimed if the nature of the role and the context within which it is carried out is not of sufficient profile or impact within the organisation to affect the overall ethos of the organisation””." That is particularly relevant to occupations such as a school secretary, a school caretaker or a dinner lady. It is important to note that this provision will not automatically extend the degree of freedom available to those schools; it will simply allow them to make a case for having regard to the religion or belief of an individual member of staff in certain cases, in accordance with existing anti-discrimination legislation.