My Lords, I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Deben: it rather looks as if the Government put a call-out to each department to offer up two or three regulations for abolition, without much thought about the priority and importance that they might have. I support the stand part debate on Clause 2. Indeed, I put my name to the intention to oppose it, introduced by the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, and supported by the noble Lord, Lord Sharkey. It seems hard to find anyone who supports the inclusion of this clause in the Bill, with the obvious exception of the noble Lord, Lord Curry, and Oliver Letwin.
As noble Lords have said, Clause 2 would remove the power of employment tribunals to issue wider recommendations to employers found to have unlawfully discriminated. I was party to passing that legislation in the Equality Act 2010. Indeed, on my side of the House, the Government of the time would have liked to have had some sanctions attached to this. However, there was a process of negotiation which the Conservative and Liberal Democrat parties agreed to. I make the point to the Committee that this is why we had that recommendation; it had all-party support from all parts of the House at the time.
The EHRC has said:
“We consider that the power to make wider recommendations is an effective way of preventing unlawful discrimination from occurring and helping employers to comply with their duties to treat their employees fairly. The case for … abolition has not been made. Clause 2 of the Deregulation Bill should therefore be removed”.
The Minister needs to explain to the Committee what is wrong with these recommendations. What is his message to the people who went through all the stress and trouble of going to an employment tribunal to right an injustice, as outlined by the noble Lord, Lord Sharkey, and other
noble Lords, won there and then find that the employer is not being encouraged to do anything about those of their work colleagues suffering the same wrong? Does the Minister think that they should all go to the tribunal? What does he think should happen?
Finally, regarding the business perceptions referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Curry—it is the second or third time that he has mentioned them in these debates—I have to cite three cases. In Stone v Ramsay Health Care, the tribunal said that there was a “thorough and abject failure” by the employer,
“to have protected the claimant from pregnancy and maternity discrimination”.
It recommended training for senior managers and HR on pregnancy and maternity rights. In Crisp v Iceland Foods, the HR manager’s awareness of mental disability was “no less than woeful”, according to the tribunal. It recommended that those with HR responsibilities and area level managers be trained on disability discrimination rights. In Austin v Samuel Grant (North East) Ltd, the managing director had a long history of sending racist and sexist e-mails and the human resources manager had failed to deal properly with that issue. The tribunal recommended that the employer updated its policies on discrimination and that the directors and managers received diversity training. I cannot quite see what the overwhelming burden on industry is through those recommendations.