Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting: Human Rights
Debate between Lord Cormack and Baroness Verma(9 years ago)
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Baroness Verma
My Lords, I welcome the noble Lord to his post on the Front Bench and I look forward to working with him, particularly in this area. At CHOGM, I will be chairing the round table on LGBT issues. It is absolutely unacceptable in the 21st century that we are still looking at these issues, but we have to do it with sensitivity. We have to work with countries where these are sensitive issues and make sure that we continue to raise them while also working locally on the ground, with grass-roots organisations, to offer help and support.
Lord Cormack (Con)
My Lords, will my noble friend try to ensure that it is made plain to the new Government in Burma—or Myanmar, as it is sometimes called—that they would be most welcome in the Commonwealth?
Baroness Verma
My noble friend is right to raise the issue of the Burma elections, which allow us an opportunity to make some real progress with the reforms process that started in 2011. We look forward to working with Burma.
Energy: Electricity Supply
Debate between Lord Cormack and Baroness Verma
Baroness Verma
As the noble Lord knows, I am a person of great optimism and the negotiations are ongoing. We should be optimistic about what this country can offer for nuclear and for renewables.
Lord Cormack
My Lords, reverting to the point of balance raised by the noble Lord, Lord Ezra, does my noble friend agree that it is far more important that we keep the lights on than that we achieve a European target at a specific time? Perhaps some installations that are mothballed ought to be taken out of mothballs.
Baroness Verma
No, my Lords, the path that the Government have taken is absolutely the right one. A number of plants are mothballed, but, as I said earlier, they can come on board if we require them. At this moment, we do not require them.
Energy: Wind Farms
Debate between Lord Cormack and Baroness Verma
Baroness Verma
My Lords, the noble Baroness raises important points that are relevant to Northumberland. I reassure her that all wind farms must be well designed and well sited to be approved, and applications for onshore wind farms can be turned down because of local concerns. The Government have taken this issue very seriously, which is why we called for evidence. That consultation has recently closed. We are looking at what the response has been to that and we will report back in spring, with a full report in May.
Lord Cormack
My Lords, will my noble friend heed what was said by the noble Baroness opposite? Onshore wind farms are unreliable, uneconomical and unsightly, and Mr John Hayes voiced the views of many people in this country when he said, “Enough is enough”.
Baroness Verma
I reassure noble Lords that we have taken the concerns of local constituencies very seriously, which was why we called for evidence. However, this does not mean that we will be changing our policy. Government policy remains that onshore wind will continue to be part of ensuring that we have a diverse mix of renewable energy sources.
Energy: Draft Energy Bill
Debate between Lord Cormack and Baroness Verma
Baroness Verma
My Lords, as I have stated at this Dispatch Box before, wind farms are part of our energy mix. They need to be part of our renewables energy mix and we continue on that path.
Lord Cormack
My Lords, will my noble friend accept that when Mr Hayes said “enough is enough”, he echoed the feelings of many people throughout this country? We believe that he is a hero and we hope the Minister agrees.
Baroness Verma
My Lords, I reassure my noble friend and noble Lords in this House that our policy remains the same.
Energy: Costs
Debate between Lord Cormack and Baroness Verma
Baroness Verma
My Lords, the noble Lord raises an important point, but in anticipation of someone asking this question, I have looked at the net margins of energy companies. By and large, their net margins have remained at around 3.4%, so they are not working with huge margins. Perhaps I may say once again that I want energy companies to direct people towards better tariffs if they are available or make it much easier for consumers to change suppliers. That gives consumers choice and puts energy companies in competition.
Lord Cormack
My Lords, can we go back to these ghastly wind farms? They produce indeterminate amounts of energy, they cost a great deal of money and they shut down when the wind blows too hard. What real justification is there for onshore wind farms?
Baroness Verma
My Lords, I know that my noble friend is greatly concerned about wind farms, but perhaps I can reassure him that on 20 September last we called for evidence to see how well we are doing in terms of our targets on wind farms. I can also assure him that, by and large, we have reached our capacity for onshore farms through what we have already done and what is in the pipeline. My noble friend can rest assured that there will not be a burst of wind farms across the landscape. We are taking wind farms as part of the energy mix that this country needs.
Marriages and Civil Partnerships (Approved Premises) (Amendment) Regulations 2011
Debate between Lord Cormack and Baroness Verma(12 years, 11 months ago)
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Baroness Verma
My Lords, perhaps the noble Lord, Lord Dannatt, could speak first and then my noble friend Lord Cormack.
Lord Dannatt
My Lords, had I spoken earlier in this debate, I would have made a lengthy speech, much of which has been overtaken by the course of events, which would have been in support of the noble Baroness, Lady O’Cathain. I maintain my support for her today.
Much legal opinion has been expressed on both sides of the argument and a fair consensus would appear to have emerged, but I am left with a residual feeling of ambiguity. Ambiguity can give rise to unintended consequences, and it is unintended consequences that I am worried about. Those consequences arise from regulations that are not crystal clear and have worried a lot of ordinary decent people up and down this country, who have filled noble Lords’ postbags and mine in the past few days.
The noble Lord, Lord Henley, circulated his letter, which we received yesterday, in which he states—and we have heard it repeated already today—that,
“if a successful legal challenge were ever brought, I would like to provide reassurance that the Government would immediately review the relevant legislation”.
If we think that there is some doubt or ambiguity in this case, and if we think that ambiguity could lead to unintended consequences, there is an obligation on the Minister to activate that sentence in the last paragraph of his letter and, for the avoidance of doubt, to make it crystal clear—an expression that we have heard many times in this Chamber today—to people up and down the country, whoever they are, that they have nothing to fear from these regulations. Until I hear a commitment to the avoidance of doubt, I maintain my support for the noble Baroness, Lady O’Cathain.
Equality Act 2010 (Specific Duties) Regulations 2011
Debate between Lord Cormack and Baroness Verma(13 years, 2 months ago)
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Baroness Verma
My Lords, I am delighted to be leading this debate and to have the opportunity to explain the Government’s policy regarding the specific duties regulations.
I will first say a little about the equality duty, which these specific duties support. On 5 April this year, the Government brought into force the new public sector equality duty contained in Section 149 of the Equality Act 2010. The duty requires public bodies and those discharging public functions to have due regard to the need to eliminate discrimination and other conduct prohibited by the Act, advance equality of opportunity and foster good relations between people who share a relevant protected characteristic and those who do not share it. The relevant protected characteristics are age, race, sex, disability, gender reassignment, pregnancy and maternity, religion or belief, and sexual orientation, and, in relation to eliminating unlawful discrimination and harassment, marriage and civil partnership.
The objective behind the new equality duty, like the previous race, disability and gender equality duties, is to ensure that consideration of equality forms part of the day-to-day decision-making and operational delivery of public bodies. However, the new duty is considerably stronger than those previous duties. As well as extending to all nine protected characteristics, it also sets out in primary legislation for the first time what considering the need to advance equality of opportunity involves. Section 149(3) of the Equality Act 2010 makes clear that in particular it involves considering the need to remove or minimise disadvantages suffered by people who share particular protected characteristics, to take steps to meet their particular needs, and to encourage people who share particular protected characteristics to get involved in public life and other activities where their participation is disproportionately low.
This new strengthened equality duty will be supported by specific duties set out in regulations which we are discussing today. The purpose of the specific duties is to help public bodies carry out the equality duty more effectively. This is a very important point and I want to emphasise it strongly. The equality duty itself, set out in primary legislation, is the key provision. That is already in place, and, as I have explained, it is stronger and broader than the previous duties. The specific duties do not extend, restrict or change the equality duty in any way. They are simply designed to help public bodies to perform the equality duty better as was the intention behind the specific duties which supported the previous race, disability and gender equality duties.
However, having commenced the new stronger equality duty, the Government are putting forward a radical new approach for supporting specific duties. In the past, public bodies tended to get bogged down in detailed, bureaucratic, process-driven requirements such as producing vast equality impact assessments that ticked a box but had no impact on the decisions taken. Our approach is different. We want public bodies to focus on delivering real progress on equality and to be transparent about that so that the public can hold them to account. It is a fundamental shift from bureaucratic accountability for filling in the right forms to democratic accountability for delivering equality improvements for service users. The specific duties that we are proposing, instead of focusing on processes, require public bodies listed in the regulations to publish information to demonstrate their compliance with the equality duty and to set themselves equality objectives. The requirement to publish information to demonstrate compliance with the equality duty is a strong requirement. Compliance with the equality duty is an objective matter, determined by the courts. While there is flexibility in the regulations, each public body must publish information to demonstrate that it is complying with the equality duty. If it does not, the Equality and Human Rights Commission can issue a compliance notice which is also enforceable through the courts.
Case law on the previous duties, which is still relevant, provides useful guidance as to what is required to comply with the equality duty. In brief, public bodies must ensure that they have the right information to hand about equality issues to make informed choices and decisions and to ensure that this is rigorously considered before and at the time decisions are taken. Case law has also made clear that in some cases it will be necessary to consult relevant parties likely to be affected by a decision, such as local disability groups and women's groups. In order to demonstrate their compliance with the equality duty, public bodies will generally need to publish information about what they have concluded will be the effect of their activities on people with different protected characteristics and the information they considered in making their decisions, including those they have consulted and involved.
The regulations give public bodies flexibility to publish the information that they believe best demonstrates their compliance with the equality duty and which is most useful to their staff and service users in holding them to account for their performance on equality. This means that public bodies will be able to publish the information that is right for their particular circumstances. What is right for a small school will be different from what is right for the Department for Education.
We have two stipulations. First, public bodies must include information relating to people who share a relevant protected characteristic who are affected by their policies and practices—their service users. For example, we would expect a local authority to have considered how its provision of social housing affects women who have been victims of domestic violence, or disabled people who have particular access requirements. We would expect the local authority to publish information on this, and to explain how it considered it and whether it took action as a result. Secondly, public bodies with 150 or more staff must publish this information in relation to their employees. For example, we would expect a government department to have considered how its policies affect employees with different protected characteristics, and to publish information such as its gender pay gap and the proportions of staff at different levels who are disabled or from ethnic minorities.
We will ensure that there is sector-specific guidance from the Government and the Equality and Human Rights Commission to help different types of public body think through what sort of information they should publish. All public bodies listed in Schedule 1 to the regulations must publish this information by no later than 31 January 2012 and at least annually thereafter. Schools listed in Schedule 2 to the regulations must do the same, but by 6 April 2012 and at least annually thereafter. The additional time for schools—a full term—is to help them prepare and implement the new requirements in compliance with the preparation timescales for any regulations on schools recommended by the Merits Committee.
Turning to the specific duty to set equality objectives, each public body listed in the two schedules to the regulations must prepare and publish one or more specific and measurable equality objective. They are required to publish these objectives by no later than 6 April 2012 and at least every four years thereafter.
Baroness Verma
My Lords, if my noble friend will allow me to finish, he will see that this is exactly what we are doing.
The objectives set out should clearly illustrate the real equality improvements that the public body intends to deliver over the course of the business cycle. They should focus on the key inequalities that the body is in a position to affect, as highlighted in its published information, and identify achievable, measurable improvements. For example, if a local authority’s data show that very few older people access a service from which they might benefit, the authority might set an objective to increase the rate of take-up by a certain percentage within a specified period, to ensure that such services genuinely advance equality of opportunity for all. This requirement to publish equality objectives will help to ensure that the public and the voluntary and community sector organisations understand the key inequalities that public bodies are focusing on tackling and can track progress against these. The Government are commissioning the production of a toolkit to help voluntary and community sector organisations to use transparency delivered by the equality duty to hold public bodies to account for their performance on equality.
The regulations require public bodies, with the sole exception of schools, to publish information in advance of setting their equality objectives. This is to help to ensure that the public and voluntary and community sector organisations have the opportunity to consider the data that will inform the equality objectives that public bodies set themselves. This is a key element of the Government’s policy: to ensure that public bodies are transparent and accountable to the people they serve for delivering real equality improvements that will give people fair chances. I commend these regulations to the House.
Amendment to the Motion
Fixed-term Parliaments Bill
Debate between Lord Cormack and Baroness Verma(13 years, 4 months ago)
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Baroness Verma
My Lords, perhaps the noble Lord, Lord Rennard, could carry on and the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, could speak after him.
Insurance: Gender Discrimination
Debate between Lord Cormack and Baroness Verma(13 years, 8 months ago)
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Lord Cormack
My Lords, does not this demonstrate that on this occasion the Court behaved as a court of injustice?
Baroness Verma
My noble friend raises a good point, but I am afraid that I have to go by the ruling, as we all do as members of the EU.