Home Secretary and
Minister for Women and Equality Theresa May has today announced
that the socio-economic duty, which was created as part of the
2010 Equality Act, will be scrapped.
The announcement came as the Home Secretary outlined a radical
new approach to equalities that rejects political correctness and
social engineering.
In a speech at the Coin Street Community Centre in south London,
the Home Secretary announced plans to tackle inequality by
treating people as individuals rather than labelling them in
groups, and ending the top-down approach that saw Whitehall trying
to impose equality from above.
The speech also underlined the Government's ongoing
commitment to equality and fairness. This included the Home
Secretary announcing that a measure in the Freedom Bill will allow
people who were prosecuted for having consensual gay sex at a time
when this was illegal to apply to have their convictions deleted
from criminal records.
Home Secretary and Minister for Women and Equality Theresa May said:
"Equality has become a dirty word because it has come to
be associated with the worst aspects of pointless political
correctness and social engineering.
"Just look at the socio-economic duty. In reality, it
would have been just another bureaucratic box to be ticked. It
would have meant more time filling in forms and less time focusing
on policies that will make a real difference to people's
life chances.
"We need to move away from this old approach and make
equalities work for everyone. We need equalities policy to work
with the grain of human nature, not against it. Legislation on its
own is not enough. Government will no longer dictate how people
should behave. Instead we will put in place an architecture to
support business and wider society to do the right thing."
Instead of issuing top-down targets, the new approach will see
the Government encouraging greater transparency so that the public
have the power to hold organiations to account. Instead of trying
to engineer equal outcomes for all, the Government will, in line
with its commitment to fairness, seek to create a level playing
field where everyone has equal access to opportunity.
Up to 12,000 men will be treated more fairly thanks to the
changes relating to convictions for consesual gay sex with over
16s. Until 1967 gay sex was illegal and many men who were
convicted in the 1960s can now find themselves unable to volunteer
with some charities because criminal record checks show they have
been convicted of a "sexual offence." The
Freedom Bill, due to be published in January next year, will
change the law so that people can apply to have such convictions
deleted from the Police National Computer.
MEDIA ENQUIRIES
For further details on the new approach to equalities and the
socio-economic duty contact the Government Equalities Press Office
on 020 7035 3245.
For further details on changes to convictions for gay sex,
contact the Home Office press office on 020 7035 3535.
NOTES FOR EDITORS
You can read the full speech on the Home Office website: http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/media-centre/speeches/equality-vision
Clause One of the 2010 Equality Act created the power for the
Secretary of State to introduce the socio-economic duty. The duty
has not yet been introduced and, following today's
announcement, it will not be introduced and the Government will
look into repealing the law that allowed for its creation.
The duty stated: "An authority to which this section
applies must, when making decisions of a strategic nature about
how to exercise its functions, have due regard to the desirability
of exercising them in a way that is designed to reduce the
inequalities of outcome which result from socio-economic
disadvantage."
Contacts:
Government Equalities Office Press Office
Phone: 0207 035 7035
enquiries@coi.gsi.gov.uk
Government Equalities Office Out of hours
Phone: 07500 816 959
enquiries@coi.gsi.gov.uk