Discrimination legislation is now well established in UK employment law and the main legal developments over the past 12 months have related to anti-discrimination legislation. There are now five areas of discrimination from which all individuals, regardless of their employment status, will be protected. These are:-

• Sex discrimination
• Race discrimination
• Disability discrimination.
• Sexual orientation discrimination
• Religious discrimination

In 2006, further anti-discrimination laws will come into force relating to age discrimination.

Damages for discrimination claims

Where an employee succeeds with a claim for discrimination, the Employment Tribunal will award damages to reflect the employee’s financial loss that has resulted from the discriminatory act. There is no cap on the amount of compensation for discrimination that can be awarded by the Employment Tribunal.

Press coverage of recent discrimination claims seems to suggest that compensation for discriminatory acts will always be very high. In practice, this is not always the case and the amount will vary from case to case.

In addition to an award to reflect loss of salary and benefits, an employee will also be entitled to a further award to reflect injury to feelings brought about by the discriminatory act, and the Court of Appeal has provided guidance on the levels of compensation to be awarded for injury to feelings. These will range from £500 to £25,000. This sum will only be exceeded in the most exceptional cases.

What can we do for you?

There are many steps employers can take to avoid discrimination claims and we can discuss these with you. We encourage our clients to embrace diversity and adopt best practice in these areas. The first step is to ensure that the employer fully understands its obligations and the implications of ignoring them. It is our view that it is extremely important to train managers and ensure that they have a basic knowledge of the discrimination legislation. We can help you do this. We can also help you to develop strategies to make it easier to defend claims such as the introduction of training and equal opportunities policies etc. However, if you do end up on the wrong side of this legislation, we can provide support and advice. We can advise you on the merits of any claim that your organisation may face and either help you to settle a claim quickly and efficiently or help you to defend it at an Employment Tribunal.