The establishment of equality committees and appointment of equality officers are among the proposals in new guidelines for equality in employment. The guidelines, launched last week, are jointly published by IBEC, the ICTU and the Equality Authority.
Two weeks ago two companies were ordered by the Director of Equality Investigations to pay £5,000 and £8,000 respectively for discriminating in employment against a member of the Travelling community and a man suffering from a disability. These guidelines set out steps which, if followed, should help companies avoid falling foul of the new equality legislation.
The Employment Equality Act, which came into force in 1999, outlaws discrimination in employment against people on the grounds of gender, sexual orientation, family or marital status, age, race, religion, disability or membership of the Traveller community.
The guidelines outline ways of designing advertisements and application forms that do not carry implicit or explicit discriminatory messages, ensuring that recruitment agencies act within anti-discrimination law in recruiting migrant workers, and providing training for both human resource managers and trade unions in combating all forms of discrimination.
The guidelines also suggest setting out procedures to attract older workers, Travellers and people with disabilities into the workforce. Work in this area has already started, according to the CEO of the Equality Authority, Mr Niall Crowley.
A framework committee has been set up to develop practical policies to implement the Act.