The Virtual Pub
Come Inside... => The Commons => Topic started by: Grumpmeister on June 26, 2008, 04:05:24 PM
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Maybe I'm missing something here but surely companies already hire applicants according to their abilities. After all that would be common sense business practice, to make sure you have the best person available in each role.
Equality minister Harriet Harman has set out plans to allow firms to discriminate in favour of female and ethnic minority job candidates.
She said firms should be able to choose a woman over a man of equal ability if they wanted to - or vice versa.
The new Equalities Bill will also force employers to disclose salary structures in a bid to close the gender pay gap.
The plans, which will be adopted first across England then Wales and Scotland, will also ban all age discrimination.
Setting out the plans in a Commons statement, Ms Harman said the proposed bill - due later this year - would "address the serious inequalities that still exist" in the UK.
'Old boy network'
They would increase fairness and diversity and help Britain compete in the global economy by being more open, she told MPs.
"A society which is equal and fair is one which is more at ease with itself," she added.
I couldnt agree more, so when are you and the rest of your incompetent, money graspiing, (in my opinion) morally bankrupt and utterly corrupt cohorts going to bugger off out of government and give this country a chance to recover from the abortion you've all made of it.
The plans would also bring together all previous discrimination law into a single piece of legislation which she said would cut red tape for business.
Allowing positive discrimination would help organisations such as the police better reflect the communities they serve by recruiting more female and ethnic minority officers, said Ms Harman.
But if, for example, a headmistress wanted to discriminate in favour of a male teacher to balance an all female team that would be allowed too.
Wage gap
Asked how she could justify discrimination in the name of equality, she said she wanted tackle "patterns of discrimination" in the workforce and ensure firms were "not just 'entrenched in the old boy network'".
Age discrimination in the workplace has been illegal since 2006, but the new legislation will tackle more widespread forms of age-related prejudice.
It also aims to close the gender pay gap by forcing firms to publish pay rates.
Female part-time workers still earned 40% less per hour than their full-time male counterparts, Ms Harman told Today BBC Radio 4's Today programme.
"Do we think she is 40% less intelligent, less committed, less hard-working, less qualified? It's not the case. It's entrenched discrimination. It's allowed to persist because it's all swept under the carpet."
The bill will also seek to stop pensioners being denied NHS treatment because of their age, although doctors will still be able to refuse treatment if they believe there are sound clinical reason for doing so.
Send us your commentsAge discrimination will also be outlawed in the provision of goods and services, although there could be exemptions for things like holiday aimed at certain age groups.
It will also give women the right to breastfeed in public and outlaw "homophobic bullying" in the workplace.
Theresa May, for the Conservatives, broadly welcomed the proposals but said they "confused the government's message" by allowing discrimination in certain circumstances.
"This bill should seek to unite not divide. It has good intentions but its lack of detail and clarity is disappointing," she told MPs
She said she was willing to work with the government to improve the legislation.
The Tories want compulsory pay audits for firms found guilty of gender discrimination at employment tribunals.
Lib Dem youth and equality spokeswoman Lynne Featherstone also broadly welcomed the proposals.
But she said: "If the government genuinely wants to tackle equality it must do more to end the growing discrepancy between the rules on pay for the public and private sector.
"Without compulsory pay audits for the private sector these proposals will represent a very real victory for the hawks in the cabinet."
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I heard this ridiculous shite on the wireless this morning (not on The World Service Snoops)...
There should be a law that prevents politicians from implementing anything not specifically laid out in their manifesto. They get in on some promise to the unwashed like abolishing fox hunting or giving out free fags and then start meddling with all sorts of shite that they know nothing about and should leave well alone. Banghead
The Equality Minister for farks sake! noooo:
Bastards all of them! cussing:
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How did she get her job then?
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How did she get her job then?
By Nulabs policy of positive discrimination of course! cussing:
What utter, utter shite! noooo:
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Carried a mattress on her back for years.
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Carried a mattress on her back for years.
And a bag of Winalot for the guide dogs I hope.
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OH wrote:-
"Well the first thing they should do is tighten the security on her website.
Any idiot can wander all over it
http://www.harrietharman.org/fileadmin/
and look at what we find tucked away.....
http://www.harrietharman.org/fileadmin/ ... .FINAL.pdf
She really does hate white englishmen
What fun
http://www.harrietharman.org/fileadmin/ ... nts/womens
Should you feel you would like to leave some gay porn tucked away in her website directories, feel free
username : harriet
password : harman
lol:
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no longer i'm afraid. Wish i'd read that sooner
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noooo:
SHe was shafted by Haig yesterday! ;D ;D ;D ;D
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noooo:
SHe was shafted by Haig yesterday! ;D ;D ;D ;D
sick2:
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Metaphorically speaking redface:
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noooo:
SHe was shafted by Haig yesterday! ;D ;D ;D ;D
She looks like she needs it eveilgrin:
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I defer to your greater experience of these things spider:
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noooo:
SHe was shafted by Haig yesterday! ;D ;D ;D ;D
that was the highlight of my day yesterday ;D
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Did anyone see Harperson on the Andrew Marr show this morning.
Utterly pathetic. She refused, point blank, to accept that there is talk of ousting Broon and kept gabbing on about "the economic problems".
Nearly put my foot through to TV.
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Missed it... my telly is safe... cloud9:
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Well Incapability Brown is off on holiday now so Harridan Halfwit is now....
....will the last white male to leave please switch off the lights. Banghead
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I hear she is now proposing that wives can get away with murder if they kill their husbands cos they "fear" that they might get hurt. A new defence in law.
I see the reverse is not being proposed.
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I hear she is now proposing that wives can get away with murder if they kill their husbands cos they "fear" that they might get hurt. A new defence in law.
I see the reverse is not being proposed.
Thought they were going to call it Spousal Abuse, which would include 'battered' men.
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Battered men eh?
Well men are from Mars I suppose so in Glasgow that could work.
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Battered men eh?
Well men are from Mars I suppose so in Glasgow that could work.
drumroll: ;D