The Employment Equality (Age) Regulations 2006
From 1 October 2006 the Employment Quality (Age) Regulations make it unlawful to discriminate against workers, employees, job seekers and trainees because of their age.
Broadly, this means that:
- age cannot be taken into account in any decisions regarding recruitment, training, pay, promotion or dismissal; and
- people should not be made to feel uncomfortable at work because of their age.
The regulations are likely to have a greater immediate impact on employers' practices than any other employment legislation of recent years.
The new regulations apply to all employers and cover recruitment, terms and conditions, promotions, transfers, dismissals and training. They do not cover the provision of goods and services. The Regulations cover people of all ages, young & old.
The regulations make it unlawful on the grounds of age to:
- decide not to employ someone
- dismiss them
- refuse to provide them with training
- deny them promotion
- give them adverse terms and conditions
- retire an employee before the employer’s usual retirement age (if there is one) or retire an employee
- before the default retirement age of 65 without an objective justification
- discriminate directly against anyone – e.g. refuse to provide training
- discriminate indirectly against anyone – e.g. to apply a criterion, provision or practice which disadvantages people of a particular age unless it can be objectively justified
- subject someone to harassment (unwanted conduct that violates a person's dignity or creates an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment for them having regard to all the circumstances including the perception of the victim)
- victimise someone because they have made or intend to make a complaint or allegation or have given or intend to give evidence in relation to a complaint of discrimination on grounds of age
- Discriminate against someone, in certain circumstances, after the working relationship has ended.
A critical difference from the other discrimination legislation is that both direct and indirect age discrimination can be justified in limited circumstances, where the less favourable treatment is "a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim". A legitimate aim might include economic factors such as business needs and efficiency, the health, welfare and safety of the individual or the particular training requirements of the job. A legitimate aim must correspond with a real need of the employer - economic efficiency may be a real aim but saving money because discrimination is cheaper than non-discrimination is not legitimate. The legitimate aim cannot be related to age discrimination itself. The test of objective justification is not an easy one and it will be necessary to provide evidence if challenged, assertions alone will not be enough.
Upper age limits on unfair dismissal and redundancy will be removed. There will also be a default retirement age of 65, making compulsory retirement below 65 unlawful unless objectively justified. Employees will have the right to request to work beyond 65. The employer has a duty to consider such requests.
In practice this means:
- Date of Birth should not be requested on the Application Form or asked during an interview
Job Descriptions should avoid references, however oblique, to age in both the job description and the person specification - Stereotypical assumptions about an applicant’s health, managerial experience etc. based on their age should be avoided
- Educational and vocational qualifications have changed and developed over the years. Make sure that the qualifications you specify are not disadvantaging people at different ages.
- In relation to recruitment there will be an upper age limit of 65 – therefore discrimination on the grounds of age will be permitted when recruiting persons of 65 & over.
For further information:
http://www.dti.gov.uk/employment/discrimination/age-discrimination/index.html
