IoD: repeal of Dual Discrimination rules welcome

Dated: 23 March 2011

Commenting on George Osborne’s announcement in today’s budget that the last government’s planned Dual Discrimination rules – which allowed a discrimination case to be brought on the grounds of two identifying characteristics – will be repealed, Alexander Ehmann, Head of Employment Policy at the Institute of Directors, said:

“The Government has talked a good game on regulation and employment law, but has produced very few meaningful improvements for business to date. However, the decision to repeal the Dual Discrimination provisions of the Equality Act is a tangible piece of de-regulation and we are pleased to see that the IoD’s arguments have won through.

He added:

“Dual discrimination provisions threatened to increase the scale and complexity of workplace disputes at the same time as moves were afoot to improve the employment tribunal system. The Government deserves credit for this important repeal of an unnecessary change.”

ENDS

Contact Points

Edwin Morgan
Media Relations Manager
Institute of Directors, 116 Pall Mall, London SW1Y 5ED
Tel: +44 (0)20 7451 3392
Mob: +44 (0)7814 386 243
Email: edwin.morgan@iod.com
Website: www.iod.com/policy

Notes to editors

  • The IoD (Institute of Directors) was founded in 1903 and obtained a Royal Charter in 1906. The IoD is a non-party political organisation with upwards of 45,000 members in the United Kingdom and overseas. Membership includes directors from right across the business spectrum – from media to manufacturing, e-business to the public and voluntary sectors. Members include CEOs of large corporations as well as entrepreneurial directors of start-up companies.
  • The IoD offers a wide range of business services which include business centre facilities (including ten UK regional centres [three in London, Reading, Birmingham, Cardiff, Manchester, Nottingham, Edinburgh and Belfast] and one each in Paris and Brussels), conferences, networking events, virtual offices and hotdesking, issues-led guides and literature, as well as free access to business information and advisory services and a comprehensive Information Centre. The IoD places great emphasis on director development and has established a certified qualification for directors – Chartered Director – as well as running specific board-level and director-level training and individual career mentoring programmes.
  • In addition, the IoD provides an effective voice to represent the interests of its members to government and key opinion-formers at the highest levels. These include ministers, constituency MPs, Select Committee members and senior civil servants. IoD policies and views are actively promoted to the national, regional and trade media.
  • For further information, visit our website: www.iod.com
  • You can also keep up to date with the latest views from the IoD on twitter.com/The_IoD and at blogs.iod.com