Equality Bill

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The Equality Bill is a proposed act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom which was announced in May 2008 as part of the British government's draft legislative programme for the year ahead.

The ruling Labour Party included a commitment to an Equality Bill in its 2005 election manifesto. The Discrimination Law Review was established in 2005 to develop this legislation. This review is currently led by the Government Equalities Office. The review considered the findings of the Equalities Review Panel, chaired by Trevor Phillips, which reported in February 2007.^[1] The government had previously referred to the outcome of this review as the Single Equality Bill.^[2]

The bill is intended to simplify the law by bringing together existing anti-discrimination legislation. Most of the existing law is contained in the following legislation:

The Equal Pay Act 1970
The Sex Discrimination Act 1975
The Race Relations Act 1976
The Disability Discrimination Act 1995
The Employment Equality (Religion or Belief) Regulations 2003
The Employment Equality (Sexual Orientation) Regulations 2003;
The Employment Equality (Age) Regulations 2006
The Equality Act 2006
The Equality Act (Sexual Orientation) Regulations 2007

The bill would also extend until 2030 the exemption from sex discrimination law allowing political parties to select all-women candidate short-lists. The existing exemption until 2015 was created by the Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Act 2002.

[edit] Reform of the Monarchy

In April 2008, Solicitor General Vera Baird announced that as part of the Single Equality Bill, legislation would be introduced to repeal parts of the Act of Settlement 1701 that prevent Roman Catholics or those who marry Roman Catholics from ascending to the throne, and to change the inheritance of the monarchy from cognatic primogeniture to absolute primogeniture, i.e. the first-born heir would inherit the throne regardless of their gender or religion.^[3] However, Attorney General Baroness Scotland subsequently ruled there would be no change in the law of succession in 2008, saying, "To bring about changes to the law on succession would be a complex undertaking involving amendment or repeal of a number of items of related legislation, as well as requiring the consent of legislatures of member nations of the Commonwealth".^[4]