Two recent decisions of the Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT)
provide guidance on what employers must do in order to justify age
discrimination
THE AGE REGULATIONS
General
The Employment Equality (Age Regulations) 2006 (the
"Regulations") outlaw direct age discrimination (where a
person (A) treats another person (B) less favourably than another
on grounds of B's age) and indirect discrimination (where A
applies to B a provision, criterion or practice which he applies
equally to others but which puts people of B's age group at a
particular disadvantage and specifically does put B at that
disadvantage). So, in the context of a redundancy scheme, if B is
30, to make a higher award to those over 40 would be directly
discriminatory against B; and to use a higher multiplier for those
with 10 years' service could also be indirectly discriminatory
against B (because she is less likely to have been at work that
long).
