Equality Act 2010

Since the first anti-discrimination legislation was passed the number of legal provisions to deal with discrimination has grown very rapidly: there are now more than 35 Acts, 52 Statutory Instruments, 13 Codes of Practice, 3 Codes of Guidance and 16 EC Directives and Recommendations. This makes it difficult for anyone to understand their rights and responsibilities, and there are numerous inconsistencies, with some people having more rights than others. The BHA is one of many organisations which campaigned for a complete overhaul of discrimination legislation which would harmonise and simplify the law. 

In the past few years, before the Equality Act 2010 was made into law, we worked hard to ensure that many of our key concerns would be reflected in it. For example, we made detailed responses to a number of consultations during the Equality Bill's development.

During the Equality Bill's passage through Parliament, we worked closely with a range of organisations as well as our supporters in Parliament to have amendments made to the Equality Bill which sought to increase protection against discrimination for humanists and others, and to minimise the exceptions from the law granted to religious organisations.

Read our briefings to Parliamentarians and our other work on equality law.

What’s happening now?

The Equality Act 2010 was made into law in April 2010. It represents a single charter for equality, which will be better understood by citizens than previous fragmented law and around which a new culture of equality can cohere with the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) as its watchdog.

Unfortunately, the Equality Act contains a number of exceptions to allow religious organisations and individuals to discriminate against others in employment, in the provision of services and in other ways that we consider are unjust and unnecessary.

Find out more here.

What are we doing?

We have been working on the statutory and non-statutory guidance that accompanies the Equality Act. This guidance will be published in stages throughout 2010 and 2011, and aims to give guidance on the law itself, and be used as a guide for people to understand their rights in various circumstances, such as in employment or education. 

You can see the first publications here.

We are currently working on our own guidance on the Equality Act, which we will publish on these pages soon.

What can you do?

You can support the BHA's campaigns by becoming a member. Campaigns cost money – quite a lot of money – and we need your financial support. Instead or in addition, you can make a donation to the BHA.