'Legislation fatigue' could undermine Equality Bill, says survey

The study, carried out by Pinsent Masons, the law firm behind OUT-LAW.COM, in conjunction with human-resources magazine Personnel Today, found that while the HR profession is broadly supportive of increasing workplace equality, senior HR managers showed a lack of enthusiasm for the proposed Bill.

A framework for the proposed law was published in June. It will allow employers to discriminate in favour of female and ethnic minority job candidates. It also bans contractual prohibitions on staff discussing pay with each other.

Concerns over the amount of time and money it would take to implement the new regulations, along with a fear that certain aspects such as 'positive action' in recruitment could lead to an increase in claims from employees, were the biggest worries.

HR professionals are already spending more time on employment law than they did two years ago. All of the senior managers responding to the survey said that the amount of time spent dealing with legal issues had increased during this time, with administration the biggest time-waster.

The Equality Bill is expected to be pushed through parliament quickly and could become law as early as next spring. It follows several pieces of equality legislation which have been introduced or changed in recent years, including those in areas such as sexuality, age, religion and belief.

Although the bill aims to 'declutter the law', it seems that it is precisely the fact that HR teams will have yet another piece of legislation to contend with, and not a great deal of time to prepare for it, that is causing apathy among senior ranks. More than a third of respondents (36%) did not even think the bill would make employment law easier to understand – one of the government's key objectives for introducing the legislation.

Selwyn Blyth, Senior Associate and National Client Training Manager in the employment law team at Pinsent Masons said organisations are growing tired of new employment laws.

"HR directors have faced a great deal of equality legislation introduced by the government in recent years and with this bill it's almost as if we've reached legislation fatigue," he said. "Given the apparent apathy for the new legislation, you would have to question whether or not organisations will commit adequate resources to it – if there is not the top-level commitment, the government may find that we're five years down the line, with no apparent change."

At the moment there is very little information on what will be needed to comply with the Equality Bill in practice, according to Blyth.

"The Government is keen to push this legislation through, but without better communication with business, and the HR profession in particular, there could a lack of 'buy-in' which results in problems when the Act comes in to force, as it is expected to next year," he said.