Sex Discrimination Act : Reforms Ahead

Originally published May 2005

Nearly 30 years after the UK first introduced laws to outlaw sex discrimination in the workplace, the Sex Discrimination Act is to receive a major overhaul. The reforms, which are designed to implement amendments to the European Equal Treatment Directive, are contained in draft regulations which are currently subject to a consultation exercise by the DTI. Once finalised, they will come into effect on 1 October 2005.

The Main Changes

The reforms of most interest to employers include:-

• a new definition of indirect discrimination for the employment provisions of the Act. This requires claimants to show they have been put at ‘a particular disadvantage’ as compared with the opposite sex and so moves away from numerical comparisons between groups of employees which the law currently demands. The practical effect will be to reduce the need for claimants to rely on statistical evidence to prove their cases. Expert or other witness evidence may well be