The Equality Act 2010 consolidates and streamlines various pieces of anti-discrimination legislation into a single act. It aims to protect individuals from discrimination on the basis of age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, sex and sexual orientation. The Act prohibits discrimination in employment, education, access to goods and services, housing, and transport. However, discrimination still exists in practice due to factors like stereotypes in media and education as well as difficulties enforcing the law.

1. F910 – PROMOTING QUALITY
CARE
LEGISLATION

2. WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW
All members of society have fundamental human rights. You need to
appreciate how the law is used to protect and promote certain rights. For
the groups of people who use services below, you need to consider their
needs and the issues they face in society today and how current legislation
seeks to address these needs, which for testing purposes will be limited to:
 children and young people, e.g. Every Child Matters;
 vulnerable adults, e.g. PoVA;
 people with disabilities, e.g. Disability Discrimination Act;
 minority ethnic groups, e.g. Race Relations Act;
 men and women, e.g. Sex Discrimination Act;
 older people, e.g. Equality Bill.
You need to identify the appropriate piece of legislation that would
protect the groups above and give an outline of the key features of the
legislation. You need to know how the legislation protects their rights and
aims to address their needs. You need to understand the strengths and
weaknesses of named legislation in addressing their needs.

3. EQUALITY ACT 2010
There used to be several different laws to protect people from discrimination
on grounds of:
• race
• sex
• sexual orientation (whether being lesbian, gay, bisexual or heterosexual)
• disability (or because of something connected with their disability)
• religion or belief
• being a transsexual person (trans-sexuality is where someone has changed,
is changing or has proposed changing their sex – called ‘gender reassignment’
in law)
• having just had a baby or being pregnant
• being married or in a civil partnership (this applies only at work or if
someone is being trained for work),
• age (this applies only at work or if someone is being trained for work).
The Equality Act 2010 simplifies the laws and puts them
all together in one piece of legislation.

4. EQUALITY ACT 2010
KEY FEATURES OF THE ACT
 women have the right to breastfeed in public places
 prohibits discrimination in education, employment, access to goods
and services, management of premises, housing.
 covers direct and indirect discrimination
 covers victimisation/harassment
 changed the definition of gender re-assignment
 Allows for positive action. Discrimination on the basis of the
perception of a protected characteristic is now an offence and you an
actively set up training for a group such as travellers, gay people etc
 Includes depression as a disability
 Employers cannot ask questions about health in applications
 Women & men can find out how much people on their organisation
are paid and challenge if they are paid less (pay secrecy).
 Protects carers & those associated with protected people from
discrimination (associative discrimination).

5. EQUALITY ACT 2010
KEY FEATURES OF THE ACT continued
 Gives more power to employment tribunals who can now
recommend changes in a work place for all employees as well as
the person who bought the case.
 You can make County Court claims if you are discriminated
against when buying goods or getting services.
 You can also get support and advice from the Equality and
Human Rights Commission: www.equalityhumanrights.com
 Established Government Equalities Office website:
www.equalities.gov.uk
 Acas (Advisory, Conciliation & Arbitration Service) can also
provide support: www.acas.org.uk
 You can also visit Citizens Advice Bureau

6. EQUALITY ACT 2010
STRENGTHS
 helps raise awareness
 gives people more rights
 more opportunities for women and men
in society
 closed pay differentials to an extent
 more equality in terms of job
opportunities
 high profile cases have been won and
made employees think differently
 school curriculum more equality and
encouragement to partake in range of
subjects
 system of redress/support
 helped to reduce a range of
discrimination
 activity of commission supports people
WEAKNESSES
 legislation alone does not reduce
discrimination it still exists – need to work
harder at changing attitudes
 more emphasis needed within education,
advertising, media etc to improve role models
and reduce stereotypes
 difficult to police the amount of
discrimination occurring & hard to prove
 still big differences in pay between men and
women
 top positions often still held by men
 gender stereotyping still very influential e.g
influence of the family/media
 Cost & emotional stress and time to take
cases to court
 many people unaware of their rights
 fear of victimisation

7. TYPICAL EXAM QUESTIONS
June 09 - Karenza has decided she wishes to return to work after
the birth of her first child. Her employer tells her the job is not
really appropriate for ‘someone with a baby’.
 (a) Name the legislation that makes such discrimination illegal.
 (b) Analyse how this legislation could support Karenza.
June 10 - Name one piece of legislation which seeks to protect the
rights of people with disabilities. Identify three areas where this
legislation applies.
Describe the key features of a relevant piece of legislation of your
choice protecting race.
Discuss possible reasons why the implementation of this
legislation has not necessarily stopped discrimination against
minority ethnic groups in the UK.