by Alka Sehgal Cuthbert, spiked
New Labour’s flagship equalities law has encouraged us to see racism everywhere.
One of the final pieces of legislation from the New Labour era, the Equality Act 2010, is seen in a positive light by many.
Bringing together various existing laws, such as the Sex Discrimination Act 1975 and the Race Relations Act 1976, this monumental piece of legislation nominally protects individuals against discrimination on the basis of nine ‘protected characteristics’, including sex, race, disability, pregnancy and religion. Many see it as a bulwark against bigoted practices, a legal edifice that provides vital safeguards in the workplace and beyond.
But as my co-author, barrister Anna Loutfi, and I show in ‘The Equality Act Isn’t Working’, a new report from Don’t Divide Us (DDU), the impact of the Equality Act has been far from positive, particularly in the workplace.
Indeed, over the past few years, there has been a marked increase in the number of workplace race-discrimination claims being brought to court. As our report shows, this is mainly due to employees increasingly attributing problems at work to the ‘racist’ attitudes of colleagues or management.
