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Equality Bill

These amendments to Clause 8 replace marriage with marital status so that people who are unmarried, widowed or divorced would be protected by the Equality Bill. The amendments to Clauses 13, 19 and 25 are consequential to the amended Clause 8. I regret to say that I am probably about to disappoint some of my favourite Baronesses. I apologise for that, but I hope I can convince them that we do not think this is necessary. I listened closely to the arguments when we debated these amendments in Committee. Since then, I have had the opportunity to consider these arguments. I know that my noble friend Lady Royall has listened to further representations from the noble Baronesses, Lady Coussins and Lady Finlay. It is clear that all the noble Baronesses who have spoken are committed to the cause of equality and want to ensure that people are not treated unfairly. We understand their concerns, and that is why we introduced the Equality Bill. However, in the previous debates and the discussion today, I have seen nothing to convince me that discrimination by employers against unmarried people, widows, widowers or divorced people is a real issue occurring in Britain today that needs to be addressed by the Bill. We consider that the potential scenarios presented as a justification for these amendments are covered by existing provisions in the Bill relating to gender and, possibly, age discrimination. The noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, spoke about companies and, as ever, she has researched the points she put to your Lordships’ House. Some companies cover marital status in their equal opportunities policy. The law bans discrimination because of marriage or civil partnership, but there is no evidence that people are being discriminated against because they are single, widowed or divorced. Some businesses may choose to present their policies as being inclusive of all their staff, and we think that is good practice that we do not want to discourage. However, we do not believe that that is an argument for a need to change the law to protect against discrimination. We do not believe that discrimination by employers against people because they are married is a significant problem either, as demonstrated by the evenly balanced response to the Discrimination Law Review consultation and by the lack of representations since then on this issue by the public or organisations. However, we decided to retain the existing protection not just to ensure that the type of conduct it was introduced to outlaw in 1975 does not reoccur, but because we know that this protection has been used in cases as recently as 2007. Several noble Baronesses raised the issue of widows and widowers. Widowers and widows have the same level of protection from discrimination employment. Under the Sex Discrimination Act 1975, widowers should not be treated less favourably on the grounds of sex than women, whether or not they are widows, or vice versa. It is unlawful for an employer to treat a widower any less favourably than they would treat a widow. We do not believe that this Bill will in any way send a negative message to employers. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, and others for raising those concerns. I know that she will be disappointed with our decision on this matter. We have considered her arguments closely but we believe, on the balance of evidence, that the Equality Bill should continue to provide protection only for civil and married partners under this part and will provide protection for others under other parts. The noble Baroness, Lady Afshar, raised concerns about the treatment of single and divorced women, particularly from minority groups. The examples the noble Baroness gave will be covered by the Sex Discrimination Act since it is very unlikely a single or divorced man would be treated in the same way under those circumstances. I ask the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, to withdraw her amendment.