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Mr. Smith: My hon. Friend makes a telling point. I trust that Conservative Members have learned from that experience and from the public reaction to it. The Conservative party's resistance to the commission was held in particular contempt by disabled people. I believe that the Conservative party intends to support the Bill, and I welcome that. The broader the consensus that can be achieved for the work of the commission, the more inclusive will be the support for it and the better off disabled people will be.
Mrs. Theresa May (Maidenhead): I am happy to tell the Minister that Conservative Members support the creation of the Disability Rights Commission, although that does not mean that we do not think that the Bill cannot be improved in many ways. We support the concept of creating the commission.
Mr. Smith: Fair enough, and I greatly welcome the support from all parties on the Opposition Benches for the measure. After all, the inclusive and better society that we want to achieve cannot include some people and not others--it has to include everybody. There are more than 8.5 million disabled people in this country. It is only right that their rights, and the tackling of discrimination, should be regarded as high priorities.
Mr. Tom Clarke (Coatbridge and Chryston): I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way, and I share the House's warmth towards the Bill. He has explained the arrangements covering Northern Ireland, but will he say how he expects the provisions to be applied in Scotland and Wales after 1 July?
Mr. Smith: I am pleased to be able to tell my right hon. Friend that I shall say more about the position in Scotland later in my remarks. However, I take this opportunity to place on record our appreciation of my right hon. Friend's long-standing involvement in and commitment to the cause of civil rights for disabled people, which played no small part in the introduction of the Bill.
I said that there are 8.5 million disabled people in the country, and that their rights should be a high priority. The moral and ethical justification is enough in itself, but there are broad and sound economic and social reasons
as well. The important thing is that policies and practices that advance disabled people's rights build a better Britain, for them and for us all.
The Disability Rights Commission will have a central role. It will be a source of advice and support for disabled people. It will work with organisations that represent their interests. It will need to work with everyone else who has a stake in its purpose. The links that it forges with employers and service providers will need to be strong and productive. It needs to work with them and to build their confidence, so that it can be constructive in helping them to act in accordance with the spirit, as well as the letter, of the law.
Employers and service providers will need to understand and to embrace change if that change is to be real and effective. Getting that relationship right is key to the fulfilment of the commission's purpose in helping to foster the attitudes and behaviour that will make disabled people's rights a reality.
The needs of a necessarily wide constituency will place a variety of demands on the commission, but we must guard against being too prescriptive in the Bill about how to achieve its aims. If it is to be allowed to do its job properly, it needs to be able to operate flexibly as well with a proper measure of independence from Government. We must empower it to take a wide range of action and trust it to use its resources wisely to achieve its objectives. The Bill strikes a good balance between direction and discretion, and ensures that the commission has the powers that it needs to do the job.
The commission will have the resources. It has been provisionally allocated set-up costs of £3 million and an annual budget of £11 million. That is a fair settlement, taking account of the experience of the other equality commissions. However, I assure the House that the budget is not set in stone. As the Government made clear in another place, we are prepared to review the budget in the light of operational experience. That is a reasonable way in which to proceed.
By way of background to the Bill, let me say that much thought, work and consultation went in to preparing its provisions. As its first job, we asked the disability rights task force to make recommendations on the commission's role and functions. I place on record the thanks of the Government--and, I feel sure, of the whole House--for the work of the task force. Its recommendations formed the basis of a White Paper that we published last July, which received strong support not just from disabled people but from employers and service providers.
The Bill reflects very closely the proposals that we set out in the White Paper. In making its recommendations, the task force sensibly examined existing equality commissions in the areas of sex and race in Britain, as well as bodies with similar roles abroad. A number of the Bill's provisions mirror those on the Equal Opportunities Commission and the Commission for Racial Equality. Where consistency makes sense, we have striven to achieve it. Equally, where it is desirable to update the provisions, we have done so.
The Bill was well received in another place, attracting support from all parties. A handful of amendments were adopted, largely to clarify some of the technical or operational details. We are keen to press on with establishing the commission and with getting it up and running. We expect that to happen by spring next year.
The commission's duties, which are set out in clause 2, will be to work towards the elimination of discrimination against disabled people; to promote the equalisation of opportunities for disabled people; to take appropriate steps to encourage good practice and to keep under review the workings of the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 and of the Bill when it becomes an Act.
I have already mentioned the important role that the commission will have in working with disabled people and the business and voluntary sectors, and the need for it to balance its activities in a way that best meets the aims that have been set. We believe that much can be achieved by promoting good practice and that it is therefore important that the commission should have such a function in the Bill.
Within those duties, the commission will be able to offer advice to Ministers on existing and proposed legislation--whether emanating from this country or from Europe--wherever issues arise connected with the elimination of discrimination, or equalisation of opportunities for disabled people. I am pleased to assure the House that this will include the Human Rights Act 1998. The commission will be able to give its views formally to Government on that Act and on the full range of relevant legislation. However, how and when to do that should, rightly, be a matter for the commission itself, and the Bill allows the commission that flexibility.
Clauses 3 to 5 are concerned with the commission's ability to undertake formal investigations to determine whether discrimination has taken or is taking place. They also deal with the action required by those who are the subject of investigations. Of course the Commission will work with employers, service providers and others to try to avoid discrimination initially, and, when it occurs, to tackle it through dialogue. However, when constructive dialogue does not achieve the desired effect, the commission must have the teeth needed to deal with those who persist in discriminating unlawfully.
The arrangements proposed in the Bill are based on those that currently apply to the other equality commissions; but there are also differences. We have sought to modernise and strengthen the provisions, taking account of evolving practice in those other commissions. The Bill provides that the Secretary of State may make regulations supplementing provisions affecting formal investigations, thereby allowing flexibility in responding to change and future needs.
Clause 4 currently allows for regulations to be made to define further the scope of non-discrimination notices, which are served on those who have been subject to a formal investigation when they are found to be discriminating unlawfully. The regulation-making power was intended to allow us to refine the process at a later date, taking account of changes arising from the CRE and EOC reviews. However, we have now made some further progress on that complex matter, and I therefore hope that it will prove possible to table amendments in Committee to include more detail on the matter in the Bill.
The Bill also proposes that the commission may enter into legally binding written agreements with a body that is being formally investigated. The intention is that such an agreement will bring to a halt any formal investigation and avoid the need for a non-discrimination notice. Placing such an arrangement in statute is a good innovation, which will be entirely new to equality commissions in Great Britain.
We should like the commission to work constructively with bodies that are keen to deal with shortcomings that they have identified in their organisation, and realise that that may be achieved best through written agreements. Such agreements could be reached more quickly than going through the formal investigation process, and, in many cases, are more likely to work with good will on both sides. However, if the agreements break down, we have made provision for aspects which might otherwise have been dealt with by the issue of a non-discrimination notice to be enforceable through the courts.
We believe that it is right to make such provision. Written agreements should be seen as a better option for employers or service providers who are acting unlawfully and want to do something about it, but not as a soft option. The commission will also be able to resume an investigation that was previously halted.
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