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Equality Bill

My Lords, I turn to the amendments on harassment, tabled by the noble Lords, Lord Lester and Lord Wallace, and the noble Baroness, Lady Northover. I am at one with the noble Lords in seeking that the Bill should ensure that lesbian, gay and trans pupils in schools, and indeed lesbian, gay and trans customers, are protected against bullying behaviour by schools and by service providers. As noble Lords said, it is abhorrent if gay and trans pupils are bullied at school. I am therefore grateful to them for tabling the amendments, as it gives me the opportunity again to state again very clearly that such protection is already ensured by the Bill as it stands. These amendments seek to plug a perceived gap in protection, mainly for schoolchildren but also for users of goods, facilities and services provided by or on behalf of public authorities. We gave firm assurances in Committee that no such gap exists, and I make that absolutely clear now. I am grateful for the support of the noble Baroness, Lady Morris. Behaviour that constitutes harassment as anyone would understand it is already covered by the definition of direct discrimination. Pupils subjected to ridicule by their teachers because of their sexual orientation or their gender identity, or customers insulted or turned away by service providers for the same reasons, will be able to claim that they are suffering direct discrimination by way of a detriment. We have looked long and hard at whether there might be a genuine need to extend specific provision that is modelled on the harassment clauses that apply elsewhere to schools and to the provision of goods and services, but no one has put to us, and we have been unable to imagine, a scenario in which there is unacceptable bullying behaviour in these contexts and where the direct discrimination provisions would not apply. Children in schools have been legally protected against discrimination because of sexual orientation since the Equality Act (Sexual Orientation) Regulations came into force in 2007. Those regulations do not refer specifically to harassment, but the guidance to schools on their responsibilities makes it very clear that bullying behaviour is unlawful, and gives specific examples of harassment to illustrate this. The same message will be conveyed very clearly in the guidance on the Bill. The absence of a specific harassment reference makes no difference whatever to a school’s responsibilities to the children in its care. The noble Lord asked whether the Government were dealing proactively with bullying in schools. The Department for Children, Schools and Families has placed a duty on head teachers in England and Wales to put measures in place to prevent all forms of bullying, and has provided guidance for schools on dealing with homophobic bullying. The guidance makes it very clear that a school that does not take homophobic bullying as seriously as bullying on any other ground is vulnerable to charges of discrimination. We intend to introduce a new duty on schools to record and report serious and persistent bullying between pupils and incidents of verbal and physical abuse against school staff, so we are being proactive. On Amendment 34, I thank the noble Lords, Lord Lester and Lord Wallace, for again tabling this amendment, which was debated in Committee and which we accepted in principle then. It completes the protection for school pupils who are pregnant or new mothers. I assure the noble Lord who moved the amendment today and other noble Lords that we still fully support this amendment, and I am very happy to accept it. Finally, I refer to the amendments in this group in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Wilkins, on anticipatory duties in education. Although, as the noble Baroness, Lady Morris, said, they will not change the substance of the legislation, I recognise that there is a strong feeling that they will make clearer its provisions in this respect, and on that basis I am very happy to accept them.