Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they intend to seek advice from the Propriety and Ethics team in the Cabinet Office about launching the consultation on adding caste to the list of protected characteristics in the Equality Act 2010 in a 12-week period that overlaps the general election.

General election guidance for Government Departments published by the Cabinet Office includes advice on carrying out public consultations.

That guidance primarily covers situations where an election is called once a public consultation is already under way, rather than any consideration that would be necessary about whether to launch a consultation when an election is known to be imminent.

In the case of caste, that consultation has been delayed because of legal developments in a caste-related case – Chandhok v Tirkey. The Employment Appeal Tribunal issued a judgment in December 2014 opening the possibility that claims of caste-associated discrimination may already have a legal remedy under existing legislation, namely the “ethnic origins” element of Section 9 of the Equality Act 2010.

We are now carefully considering the judgment’s implications for discrimination law in respect of caste in order to ensure the appropriate level of protection against caste-associated discrimination exists.