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Home | Commission for Equality and Human Rights | Equality Institutions Review | Consultative Events

Equality Institutions Review: Consultative Events

In taking forward the Equality Institutions Review, the Women and Equality Unit has held discussions with interested organisations.

These include, in particular, the existing commissions (the Equal Opportunities Commission, the Commission for Racial Equality, and the Disability Rights Commission), and groups representing the new strands of sexual orientation, religion and age.

These have contributed invaluably to deepening our understanding of the issues and identifying areas of concern. We are grateful for these constructive contributions.

As part of the work done so far, the Women and Equality Unit organised a seminar in July 2002, to seek views from as wide a range as possible of interested organisations about the concept of a single equality body. Over 180 people from 120 organisations took part.

They included employers, trade unions, the voluntary sector, the current Commissions, a large number of representative groups of those covered by existing equality legislation and the new strands, academia and research bodies.

As well as plenary sessions, the seminar included workshops dealing with key issues such as the structure of equality machinery; how employers’ and service providers’ needs can be met; supporting individuals; the relationship between enforcement and promotion activities, devolution, and regional and local issues. Further workshops considered issues relevant to the six strands. The seminar yielded much valuable information and many useful insights.

We want to do more than offer people the opportunity to comment on our consultation documents. To this end, we led a series of events around the country, including round table discussions between Ministers and representative organisations in the regions with a particular interest in the Equality Project. A report of the Bristol event can be accessed below.
Consultation roundtable: Bristol, 25 November 2002 (PDF, 95k)

Responding to this consultation document is far from being the end of the story. This is a complicated area and it is crucial that we get the policy right. As our work develops over the coming years we hope that the debates and level of interest in the issues continues unabated. We want to stimulate discussion and generate ideas for how equality institutions of the 21st century should look.

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