Employment: Sex Discrimination

(asked on 2nd February 2023) - View Source

Question

To ask the Minister for Women and Equalities, whether she has had recent discussions with the Equalities and Human Rights Commission on the provision of guidance on when employers can legally restrict certain job vacancies by sex.


Answered by
Maria Caulfield Portrait
Maria Caulfield
Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
This question was answered on 10th February 2023

The Equality and Human Rights Commission’s Codes of Practice on Employment and guidance on sex discrimination cover the exceptions in the Equality Act 2010 which mean in certain circumstances, it is lawful for an employer to require a job applicant or worker to have a particular protected characteristic (e.g. sex), provided certain statutory conditions are met.

Codes of Practice on Employment can be found here (Chapter 13): https://www.equalityhumanrights.com/sites/default/files/employercode.pdf

Guidance on Job Advertising can be found here: https://www.equalityhumanrights.com/sites/default/files/ehrc_advertising_-_equality_law_12.pdf

and here: https://www.equalityhumanrights.com/sites/default/files/advertising_-_faq.pdf

There are no plans to produce new guidance in this area, but EHRC keeps all its guidance under review.

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