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Did you know that around 20% of the UK workforce have disabilities, yet they find it thrice as hard to secure employment? Given the fact that most disabled people can work without any (or very little) special assistance, the Disability Discrimination Act is in place to make it unlawful to discriminate against disabled people in recruitment and employment. Discrimination under the DDA comes in two forms; direct discrimination and disability-related discrimination; understanding the differences can help both employers and employees.

Direct discrimination under the DDA occurs when am employer treats a disabled person less favourably than a non-disabled person, purely on the grounds of their disability. There is no defence of justification for direct discrimination under the DDA and hence it should not be confused with disability related discrimination, which can be justified.

Disability related discrimination makes up the majority of disability discrimination tribunals and is to do with treating people less favourably for reasons to do with how their disability manifests itself. If the employer can show that making reasonable adjustments to cater for a disability is not reasonable or practical, then the court can rule that there is substantial reason for treating the personal differently.

Last time I explained that religious discrimination is a real concern for employers because it is often hard to detect and solve, yet often results in employment solicitors being called and large tribunals being awarded. For example, although employers must be prepared to interview candidates from a range of faiths and religions when recruiting, they cannot directly ask candidates about their faith or the manner in which they practice their religion. This often results in employers being unaware of contradictions between their company’s rules and an employee’s religious practices until the problem manifests itself. When this occurs, the employer can change the business rules to accommodate the religious practice, or they can claim that the company practice is a proportionate way of achieving a business goal that cannot be changed. Here are a couple of examples of how employers and employees are expected to deal with commonplace contradictions of company rules and religious practice:

In cases of rules relating to dress and uniform, employers are usually expected to make changes to their dress codes to accommodate compulsory religious clothing. This is because most uniforms can accommodate items like turbans and burkhas with no detriment to the performance or safety of the employee. However, should the religious clothing contradict health and safety legislation, the employer may have a legitimate argument to refuse to change their dress code to accept items of clothing that will put the employee or company at risk.

A similar common-sense guideline is followed for cases when employees ask for time off for religious observance. Whilst it is deemed unreasonable for employers to refuse to give a religious employee time off for religious festivals or prayer, they are not expected to provide paid leave for religious observance and can request that employees make up any missed working hours.

The next post will be my last on religious discrimination and will serve to outline to purpose of religious discrimination laws and what it considered a “religion” in this day and age.

Over the last two posts I have explained and given examples of the fact that laws relating to religious discrimination in the workplace are used to resolve conflicts between company rules and religious practices in an understanding way. The purpose of these laws is to promote and encourage tolerance and understanding of religious faiths, in order to help people from different faiths integrate into the workplace without feeling under pressure to compromise their faith. Most the time a few basic changes to company practices can help make this possible and in these cases employers are expected to change.

To this extent, laws relating to religious discrimination protect a broad range of faiths and religions – not just the traditional, organised religions like Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Christianity and Buddhism. In fact, many will be pleased to know that the same laws apply to protect those who have no religious belief whatsoever, people whose belief is unrecognised by the religious group they affiliate themselves with and even those who are the sole practitioners of their faith. However, although religious beliefs include both theistic beliefs and non-theistic moral beliefs as to the nature of right and wrong; personal preferences or social, political or economic philosophies are not deemed to be religious beliefs, no matter how strongly they are held.

Although courts often rule in favour of religious employees, it must be remembered that the laws are not in place to punish or restrict employers, but to promote understanding and integration. In cases where religious practices genuinely compromise business goals or employee safety, the law is in place to protect the employer, not to rule in favour of outrageous cases like those we read in the tabloids. Furthermore, employees must be able to prove that their religious beliefs are a genuine part of their life – they cannot simply make them up in order to treated differently, then seek out employment solicitors when their pretend-views aren’t respected!

Workplace arrangements that cause major problems for disabled people are major contributor to the fact that disabled employees are twice as likely to be put out of work as non-disabled employees. For this reason, the Disability Discrimination Act requires employer to make reasonable adjustments to ensure that disabled persons are not put at substantial disadvantages to non-disabled persons in the workplace. Should an employer make changes to pre-existing arrangements, they are obliged to take steps to prevent these new arrangements from having a negative impact on disabled persons. This can comprise of providing training and equipment, or making adjustments to premises, working hours and supervision.

Should this not occur, an Employment Tribunal will consider various factors to decide whether the adjustments would have been reasonable. These considerations will include whether the changes would have been effective, practical and of a reasonable cost in terms of the employer’s finances. Should the Tribunal find that reasonable changes have not been made, the employer can face serious repercussions.

As ever, it is hard to know all the details regarding employment law; employment solicitors are readily available to provide help and advice for both employers and employees.

The Disability Discrimination Act makes it unlawful to treat a person less favourably on the grounds of them being disabled. Unlawful practises obviously cover recruitment and employment, but also include harassment and discrimination against the carers of disabled persons.

Harassment under the DDA involves a disabled person being subject to unwanted conduct based on their disability, which violates their dignity or creates an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment for them, for reasons relating to their disability. This conduct may even be unintentional, though in these cases all the circumstances be reasonable; innocent comments taken the wrong way by an oversensitive person will likely not be judged as harassment.

Carers for people with disability can also claim under the DDA in situations where they are harasses or discriminated against for reasons associated with their role as a carer. Refusing to give some reasonable flexibility in working hours to a mother who has to care for a disabled son, for example, could well be considered unlawful under the DDA.

Disabled persons and carers alike should seek help from employment solicitors if they feel they have been discriminated aginst in either of these manners.