Councils could face action over job cuts after failure to conduct EIAs, says union
The vast majority of local authorities have left themselves open to legal challenges after failing to complete equality impact assessments over proposed job cuts, a union has warned.
UNISON said freedom of information requests it submitted revealed that 72% of councils did not complete EIAs for their initial redundancy proposals. In addition 78% of the 235 councils failed to complete EIAs for their final job loss plans.
The union pointed out that under public sector equality duties, councils must give ‘due regard’ to equality when making decisions. It added that completing equality impact assessments was one of the key ways for local authorities to do this.
Unison urged local authorities to properly assess the impact of job cuts. Heather Wakefield, its head of local government, said: “Councils are duty bound to make sure job cuts do not have a disproportionate impact on women, on workers with disabilities or ethnic minority staff. But this survey shows they are flouting the rules and ploughing ahead with heavy job cuts regardless.
“Councils should put the brakes on and take a closer look at the effect of job cuts. Women, ethnic minorities and people with disabilities are well represented in the local government workforce, so there’s a real chance that heavy job losses will fall disproportionately onto these groups. This could leave the door wide open to costly and time-consuming legal challenges. ”
Unision’s FOI request was: “In the financial year 2009/10, where proposals that resulted in early retirements, voluntary or compulsory redundancies have been made has an Equality Impact assessment been undertaken of a) the initial proposals and/or b) the final outcome? ”
