Guidance on Cuts, Equality and Fairness

posted: 28/10/2010

In making cuts and changes to services, public bodies have to obey equality law. Equality law does not prevent public bodies from making difficult decisions about reorganisation, relocation, redundancies, and service cuts, nor does the law stop public authorities from making decisions that may affect one group more than another.

A Must: Equality Impact Assessments
But the public equality duties do enable public authorities to show they are making decisions in a fair, transparent and accountable way, considering the needs and the rights of different members of their community.

The law says public bodies have to carry out an assessment of the impact that changes to policies, procedures and practices could have on different equality groups. These assessments help public bodies make better decisions, based on robust evidence. Public bodies must then 'have regard to' the impact any changes and cuts would have on sections of the community protected by equality law.

The assessment does not have to be a document called an Equality Impact Assessment, although this is what the Equality and Human Rights Commission recommends, as it helps public authorities:

• ensure they have a written record of the equality considerations they have taken into account
• ensure that their decision includes a consideration of the actions that would help to avoid or mitigate any unfair impact on particular equality groups
• make their decisions based on robust evidence
• make the decision-making process more transparent
• comply with the law.

If an Equality Impact Assessment is not done, then the public body must use an another method to systematically assess any adverse impact of a change in policy, procedure or practice.

It is a legal obligation which should remain a top priority, even in times of economic difficulty. Failure may result in authorities facing costly, time-consuming and reputation-damaging legal challenges.

The Equality and Human Rights Commission has launched a short guide to help put fairness and transparency at the heart of the difficult financial decisions through meeting the legal obligation to assess equality impact. The guide covers:

• What the law requires now
• What the law requires from April 2011
• Guidance (for practitioners and decision-makers)
• Relevant case law
• Best practice examples
• FAQs Public authorities and service providers
• FAQs Service users and organisations

Short Guide

Full details

HIV Harassment Investigation

posted: 08/12/2009

Public bodies in England, Scotland and Wales face an inquiry into how they deal with disability-related harassment by the Commission for Equality and Human Rights, the watchdog announced.
 

The commission promises that bodies that do not adequately uphold the rights of people with disabilities, including everyone living with HIV, could face legal action.

Public bodies have a legal duty to take steps to eliminate disability-related harassment – part of their disability equality duties.
 

The inquiry, which will publish its final report in early 2011, follows the inquest into the deaths of Fiona Pilkington and her disabled daughter Francesca. Their deaths followed years of harassment and exposed weak public responses to tackling this.
 

EHRC commissioner Mike Smith said: "Disabled people experiencing harassment can become conditioned to hostile treatment, or are sometimes told to ignore it by those around them - including by public authorities. They may also go to enormous lengths to avoid putting themselves at risk which can limit their freedom and opportunities. These are unacceptable outcomes for anyone in our society."
 

Evidence exists
The commission said it already had evidence that harassment of disabled people was widespread throughout Britain and that people with learning disabilities and mental health problems were at a particularly high risk. People living with HIV similarly may experience significant harassment and violence because of stigma.
 

What are Councils and Health Bodies actually doing?
The Inquiry will look at what public bodies are doing to end disability-related harassment and to deal with its causes, including prejudice and negative attitudes; and how public authorities have involved people with disabilities in eliminating harassment and its causes – for example by effective joined-up reporting procedures.
 

Ruth Scott, director of policy and campaigns at disability Scope, said: "We would like to see the inquiry focus on how public authorities are raising awareness of disability related harassment among disabled people, to increase their confidence in reporting such cases, and supporting and training frontline staff across public authorities to ensure they respond appropriately and promptly."
A document outlining the terms of reference will be published shortly for consultation and the terms will be finalised early next year. The whole review will be completed within the year.
 

Have you evidence?

The Inquiry will collect evidence from people with HIV and other disabilities and from people affected by disability-related harassment (such as HIV negative partners and family) and from public authorities on what they are doing to tackle the issue.
 

George House Trust will work with other HIV bodies to collect and submit evidence of HIV harassment. Few cases are ever reported, mainly because of HIV stigma and the belief that complaining won’t change things for the better. This investigation, linked to the use (or not) of public powers to deal with HIV stigma, is the best opportunity to make councils, police and health bodies take real action to cut HIV harassment in society.

If people have information on HIV harassment in NW England please contact HIV Policy worker Chris at George House Trust.
 

The investigation follows the recent publication of the UK HIV Stigma Index - information in our recent report and also here. 
 

Good practice too
The Inquiry may also aim to identify examples of good practice in eliminating disability related harassment and addressing its causes.
 

The Commission will consider how public authorities have complied with their obligations in relation to the Disability Equality Duty set out in the Disability Discrimination Act 1995, the Human Rights Act, and the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
 

Useful Information and Guidance

Public Bodies Duties Guidance 
ECHR report – Promoting the safety and security of disabled people 

Sources          The ECHR press release              Community Care 
 

HIV Vaccine Hopes Up

posted: 04/09/2009

The search for a vaccine to prevent HIV infection may just have got closer - with the discovery of some antibodies that have never been seen before. 

Researchers, led by the International Aids Vaccine Initiative (IAVI), say the discovery reveals a potential new way through a weak spot in the virus's defences. The antibodies were found in donors in developing countries.

The researchers hope other similar antibodies will be discovered and that could help the hunt for an effective HIV vaccine. However there have beenmany other bright hopes many times before, so we are not holding our breath. 

Learning from exceptions

The newly found antibodies - broadly neutralising antibodies - are produced by a rare few people with HIV. It's a bit like another rare group of people with unusual genes which mean that HIV never really causes any damage to health - a group of people described as 'long-term non-progresssors.' We've reported on that twice recently. Often the best scientific way to find a solution to any problem is to find examples when the normal doesn't happen - you can learn a lot by looking for what's different between most of the population and the rare people who don't have this.

They are different to most antibodies to HIV because they neutralise most of the many types of HIV found across the world.

Vaccine workings

Vaccines teach the immune system to produce antibodies, so that if the person is then exposed to HIV, the prepared immune system would be able to successfully fight off HIV. Or if it couldn't defeat HIV completely, leave it so fatally weakened that it can't do any real damage to your health. Vaccines are more or less harmless versions of the infection you want to prevent - so cowpox was used as the first ever vaccine to prevent people from getting the closely-related, but deadly, smallpox. The immune system defeats the weak vaccine infection, but then leaves detectors in the blood that wake into instant fighting action if the real infection (HIV) comes along. 

The scientists are at a very early stage - animal experiments suggest that in theory such a vaccine would work.

Other broadly neutralising antibodies problems

Before this only four broadly neutralising HIV antibodies have been found. None of them were much good for vaccine development because they hooked onto part of HIV that is difficult for vaccine developers to exploit.

These latest antibodies seem much better hopes because they bind to HIV in places which seem much easier to reach and exploit.

Because these antibodies are very powerful you wouldn't need many to protect you. They target one of the proteins that form a spike used by HIV to infect cells. These proteins vary a huge amount so are difficult for the immune system to attack. The joy of these newly found antibodies is they latch onto one protein that does not change.

Keith Alcorn, of the HIV information service NAM, said: "Identifying antibodies that act against a broad range of HIV types will be critical for the development of an effective vaccine. We need to remember that this is an early stage of research. HIV vaccine research will be a long-term effort and we certainly shouldn't expect these findings to lead to a vaccine in a few years. A lot more work on antibodies and vaccine design is going to be needed to come up with vaccines that can be put into clinical trials."

based on Source

NAM report

Much more of the science in the report at New Scientist