§ Lord Lester of Herne Hillasked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether they intend to introduce legislation to amend the Sex Discrimination Act 1975 along the lines of the Race Relations (Amendment) Act 2000. [HL1622]
§ The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Trade and Industry (Lord Sainsbury of Turville)The Government have committed themselves to introduce a duty on public bodies to promote equality of opportunity for women and men generally when parliamentary time allows. In taking this forward, the Government will be considering the experience gained with the duty to promote race equality introduced in the Race Relations (Amendment) Act (2000).
§ Lord Lester of Herne Hillasked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether they will amend the Equal Pay Act 1970 to strengthen the right to equal pay for men and women. [HL1623]
§ Lord Sainsbury of TurvilleThe Government are continuing to take action to improve the way the Equal Pay Act 1970 works in practice. We are intending to amend the Equal Pay Act to remove the "no reasonable grounds" defence in Section 2A(1)(b) of the Equal Pay Act 1970 and limit the circumstances in which a tribunal could refuse to consider an equal value claim. We consulted on proposals in the consultationEquality and Diversity: The Way Ahead published in October 2002. Subject to parliamentary approval, these changes are due to come into effect: on 1 October 2004, at the same time as new tribunal procedures for the complex equal value cases, on which we will be consulting shortly. These form part of a wider package of measures to speed up and simplify equal pay cases and include a number of amendments that were made to the Equal Pay Act in 2003 to introduce the equal pay questionnaire, and make changes to time limits and payment of arrears.