Question

To ask the Minister for Women and Equalities, whether she has had recent discussions with the Equalities and Human Rights Commission on the provision of guidance on when employers can legally restrict certain job vacancies by sex.

The Equality and Human Rights Commission’s Codes of Practice on Employment and guidance on sex discrimination cover the exceptions in the Equality Act 2010 which mean in certain circumstances, it is lawful for an employer to require a job applicant or worker to have a particular protected characteristic (e.g. sex), provided certain statutory conditions are met.

Codes of Practice on Employment can be found here (Chapter 13): https://www.equalityhumanrights.com/sites/default/files/employercode.pdf

Guidance on Job Advertising can be found here: https://www.equalityhumanrights.com/sites/default/files/ehrc_advertising_-_equality_law_12.pdf

and here: https://www.equalityhumanrights.com/sites/default/files/advertising_-_faq.pdf

There are no plans to produce new guidance in this area, but EHRC keeps all its guidance under review.