EU Court of Justice Ruling: Religious Signs

Baroness Burt of Solihull Excerpts

Wednesday 15th March 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

As I said in my Statement, and will restate now, we will work with the ECHR to update guidance for employers for dealing with religion or belief in the workplace. As I also said before, and am happy to repeat, indirect discrimination can be lawful or unlawful. It is unlawful where it is neither legitimate nor proportionate. When an employer seeks to justify why it has banned religious symbols or certain items of clothing, it has to point out the legitimacy and proportionality of why it has done so. If that makes it far more difficult for one group of people to be employed, the discriminatory effect of their actions can be called into question.

[Baroness Burt of Solihull (LD)]

I, too, thank the Minister for this extensive explanation. We on these Benches and, I am sure, Members of the whole House believe strongly that freedom of religious dress is important in an open and democratic society. I am not the world’s best at interpreting legal judgments, I am afraid, but as I understand it, national Governments through their courts have the ability to interpret the judgment in line with existing cultural beliefs and practices. Is that the Minister’s understanding? Can she therefore confirm that all existing freedoms of religious dress in this country will be protected?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

I shall deal with the latter point precisely: yes, we will protect and uphold the freedoms that have been allowed in this country, as we always have done. It will not affect our domestic law. The noble Baroness is also right that when a judgment such as this is made, it is then referred to the national courts—in this case, the courts of France and Belgium—and it is up to them to interpret within their laws what the judgment means. As far as this country is concerned, nothing changes.

Women: Domestic and Sexual Violence Services

Baroness Burt of Solihull Excerpts

Monday 13th March 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

My noble friend highlights a truly terrible state of affairs—in fact one step worse than for some of those women who actually make it to this country, because women in other countries who have no leave to remain and have no rights in that country really are the most vulnerable women in the world. Of course the women who come here and experience domestic violence may also have no leave to remain here and may have their passports taken away from them. This is something that the Government are not just mindful of but doing something about.

[Baroness Burt of Solihull (LD)]

My Lords, Women’s Aid’s most recent annual survey found that more than a third of women’s abuse organisations were running a service with no dedicated funding. Will some of the £20 million announced in the Budget last week to tackle domestic abuse be used to support those organisations and, if so, how will it be allocated? If the Minister is unable to give precise details in her answer today, please will she write to me?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

The noble Baroness will know that the funding of £20 million she refers to has only just been announced and it is for victims of domestic violence. The tampon tax fund for 2017-18 of £15 million will most definitely focus on improving the lives of disadvantaged women and girls, including the organisations supporting women and girls affected by violence and abuse.

FTSE Companies: Gender Balance

Baroness Burt of Solihull Excerpts

Wednesday 8th March 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

My noble friend makes a very valid point, and I congratulate her on her extensive work on modernising and increasing diversity in the public appointments system. During the Davies review, the Government launched a code of conduct for executive search firms, which required signatories to ensure that significant weight is given to relevant skills, competencies and personal capabilities, rather than just a narrow focus on career experience. The Hampton-Alexander review continues a focus on recruitment: the fifth recommendation in its first report is for search firms to redouble their efforts and consider extending the code of conduct to include recruitment to senior executive roles.

[Baroness Burt of Solihull (LD)]

My Lords, on this International Women’s Day, I am wearing this purple scarf in support of the thousands of women demonstrating outside this place for pensions justice. I raise the issue of women on sporting boards, whose numbers are actually declining. The Women in Sport survey found that almost half of Britain’s sporting bodies are failing to meet the 30% target set for them. Will the Minister use this opportunity to reinforce to them the serious threat that they are under of losing their funding unless this injustice is rectified?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

I certainly concur with the noble Baroness that women’s representation on sporting boards is woeful. In fact, I had a very interesting conversation with the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, about the generally male attitude in sport. What I said to my noble friend absolutely applies to sport: women on boards enhance the professions and sports that they represent, rather than the other way round.

Gender Pay Gap

Baroness Burt of Solihull Excerpts

Tuesday 20th December 2016 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Baroness Burt of Solihull]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government, in the light of findings by the Fawcett Society that at the current rate of progress it will take over 60 years to close the gender pay gap, what steps they are taking to achieve pay parity more quickly.

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Williams of Trafford) (Con)]

My Lords, at 18.1% the gender pay gap is the lowest on record, but no gap is acceptable. Increasing transparency will accelerate progress. Delivering on our manifesto commitment, we recently laid regulations requiring large employers to publish their gender pay gap annually. The government-commissioned and independently led Hampton-Alexander review has set challenging targets to ensure that by 2020, 33% of senior leadership positions in the FTSE 100 and 33% of FTSE 350 board directors are women.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Burt of Solihull (LD)]

I am very grateful for that Answer. I am sure it is true to say that every Government over the last 40 years have sought to tackle this problem, and the gender pay gap regulations referred to by the Minister and published this month are no exception. The notes to the regulations specify that failure to comply with these regulations constitutes an unlawful act. What sanction do the Government have in mind for the EHRC to impose? Will it be a gentle slap on the wrist or should transgressors be hit where it hurts—in their pockets?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

My Lords, we do not intend to create additional civil penalties at this time but we can review that if levels of compliance are not satisfactory. As the noble Baroness said, non-compliance will constitute an unlawful act and will fall within the Equality and Human Rights Commission’s existing enforcement powers under the Equality Act 2006. I am grateful to the noble Baroness for bringing up this question and I am pleased to say that the trajectory is heading in a very positive direction.

Gender-based Violence

Baroness Burt of Solihull Excerpts

Thursday 8th December 2016 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Baroness Burt of Solihull]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what action they are continuing to take to bring down the number of women who are victims of gender-based violence.

[Baroness Burt of Solihull (LD)]

My Lords, I beg leave to ask a Question of which I have given private notice.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Burt of Solihull]

I am very grateful to the Minister for that Answer. The Women’s Aid and Nia femicide census, published yesterday, paints an extremely worrying picture. Seventy-six per cent of women killed by their ex-partner or ex-spouse were killed in the first year of separation. However, on top of that, today we hear that hundreds of police officers have abused their position of trust to sexually exploit vulnerable people. Can the Minister say what the Government are doing to protect and help women at dangerous and vulnerable times, particularly those who manage to leave abusive relationships to start a new life?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

The figures released today are absolutely stark. We welcome the work that Women’s Aid has done on the femicide census, and we are committed to working in partnership with it to help improve the response to domestic homicides. Annual statistics on domestic homicide, with a breakdown by gender, are routinely published. The Office for National Statistics has today published aggregated data on domestic homicides over the last three years, broken down at a police force level. Information on women killed by men is also gathered by the Government through domestic homicide reviews, or DHRs, and we have used those data in a DHR lessons learned analysis, which we published yesterday. We have also published updated statutory guidance for DHRs. We will be providing additional funding to roll out further training for chairs of DHRs, and there will be a series of regional events to embed learning and share best practice.

The noble Baroness also asked about police abuse of authority for sexual gain, which is a very important point. It is another shocking finding. It is important to remember that HMIC findings relate to a very small number of police officers and staff, and the vast majority of over 200,000 police personnel are dedicated and passionate about protecting the public. In the new year, the College of Policing will be releasing updated guidance on police and media relationships. The college has also been asked to consider further the feasibility of developing a new supplementary addendum to the code of ethics. However, that is to take nothing away from the shocking findings of today.

Asylum Detention Centres: Safety

Baroness Burt of Solihull Excerpts

Tuesday 29th November 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Burt of Solihull (LD)]

My Lords, LGBT asylum seekers have already faced persecution in their countries of origin. This report shows that, having risked everything to get here, they are now facing it again. Does the Minister agree that, in order to tackle a problem, you have to quantify it first? Why has the Home Office refused to break down asylum seeker numbers by gender identity and sexual orientation?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

My Lords, all genuine asylum seekers—LGBT or otherwise—have experienced persecution in the countries from which they have arrived, which is why they are in our country seeking asylum. I stress that detention is used only sparingly: to establish the identity of a person; if there is a reason to believe that a person will fail to comply with conditions; or to effect removal from the UK. But I stress that people genuinely seeking asylum have nothing to fear from seeking asylum in this country. Some of the training has been really improved with regard to the questions asked, particularly of the LGBTI community, because of the sensitivity around their claims.

Foreign Workers: Engineers

Baroness Burt of Solihull Excerpts

Wednesday 10th February 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bates]

I would never say that they are at the right level; we need to do more. However, I think there are many role models and examples of women who have succeeded in the worlds of science and engineering and we need to point to them. We should also encourage more science students to take up the degree-level qualifications required by our growing employment sector.

[Baroness Burt of Solihull (LD)]

Does the Minister really think that it is sensible to persist with a net immigration target that actually hinders manufacturers and other businesses from bringing in specially trained staff from overseas, while at the same time freezing in real terms support for further education to train the people we need here at home? What projections have the Government made on the impact that this will have on our competitiveness in the global market?

[Lord Bates]

I do not accept the premise of the question, which is that we are not investing. We are introducing the apprentice levy. We are introducing the immigration skills surcharge. The number of apprenticeships has gone up from 1.5 million to 3 million and that of science and technology apprenticeships by 74%. We are investing £200 million in universities’ science and engineering capital funds. We are doing all those things in the expectation that industry will not then go out shopping for employees overseas but will actually use the talent we have grown here at home.