Memorandum from the Northern Ireland Economic
Council
THE OPERATION OF THE FAIR EMPLOYMENT (NORTHERN
IRELAND) ACT 1989: TEN YEARS ON
The Council is in receipt of your letter dated
31 July seeking the Council's views on the extent to which the
Fair Employment (Northern Ireland) Act 1989 has succeeded in its
objectives, the difficulties which have arisen in implementing
its provisions and the need for any reform of the Act in the light
of the experience of the past ten years. The abolition of the
Fair Employment Commission and its replacement with new Equality
Commission, foreshadowed in the Northern Ireland Bill which is
before Parliament, will also be relevant.
The Council is not in a position to comment
on the success, difficulties and way forward for the Act, not
having conducted research on these issues. However, we recently
commented on the Government's Partnership for Equality
White Paper, which touches some of the issues of concern to the
Committee. A copy of the response is attached.
14 September 1998
PARTNERSHIP FOR EQUALITY WHITE PAPER
COMMENTS
OF THE
NORTHERN IRELAND
ECONOMIC COUNCIL
INTRODUCTION
The Council is pleased to respond to the Government's
proposals for promoting employment equality in Northern Ireland,
set out in Partnership for Equality. Although this is a
White Paper, it nevertheless contains elements of a Green Paper,
since for a small number of issues "where the Government
has not yet made a final decision, or where there are detailed
matters to be decided, consequent on a decision in principle"
(page 6) written comments are requested. However, since these
are in areas where the Council has done little if any research,
our comments on the White Paper are largely of a general nature.
PROMOTING THE
RIGHT OBJECTIVE:
ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
The Council welcomes the broad thrust of the
Government's proposals for employment equality. We have consistently
argued that policy should promote economic development
rather than just economic growth. By this the Council means
that the talents and aptitude of each member of the population
should be given every chance to grow and be rewarded. Thus policy
should be concerned not only with growth but also with reducing
unemployment, eliminating educational underachievement, abolishing
poverty and ensuring that income distribution does not become
too unequal. In sum, policy should be concerned with reducing
economic and social marginalisation for large parts of the population.
To some extent, of course, these policy concerns
are mutually reinforcing. Indeed, as the White Paper rightly points
out, "Equality of opportunity is a fundamental human right
which would also accelerate economic growth by maximising human
potential. Furthermore, widespread confidence that the labour
market operated fairly, with recruitment and promotion based on
merit, would lead to greater social cohesiveness and better relations
between different sections of the community." (paragraph
1.1.).
Recent announcements by Government have seen
a movement towards economic development as the objective of economic
policy in the UK. The Council noted in its commentary on the 1997
UK Budget how employment growth has been added to GDP growth as
a macro-economic goal. Our analysis of the impact of the 1997
and especially the 1998 UK Budgets demonstrates how income has
been redistributed in Northern Ireland from richer to poorer households,
a decisive break with the pattern of previous Budgets. However,
Government has not neglected GDP growth, with the Chancellor and
the President of the Board of Trade announcing in May 1998 that
bridging Britain's productivity gap is the next big national challenge.
The Government's proposals for employment equality
fit well within this framework for economic development. The importance
of equality of opportunity is quite rightly the centrepiece of
the White Paper, although equality of opportunity will not of
course secure equality of outcome, given the tremendous diversity
of people along a whole series of variables. One of the strengths
of the White Paper is the way it systematically deals with resolving
unemployment through initiatives such as New Deal programmes designed
to improve the life chances of pupils through improvements in
the school system and the New TSN with its "emphasis on addressing
problems of unemployment and employability" (paragraph 4.17).
All these issues have been addressed in recent
publications by the Council, not least in the work which we are
doing on underachievement in schools. We welcome the research
now being promoted by the Government into the selection system
at age 11, to which reference is made in the White Paper. We were
disappointed that no reference was made to the issue of underprovision
of places for Higher Education in Northern Ireland which featured
in the Dearing Report on Higher Education in the UK.
EMPLOYMENT EQUALITY
FOR ALL?
Employment equality in terms of promoting equal
opportunity into employment (and training and promotion) should
apply to all in Northern Ireland. The White Paper refers
to those categories already subject to legislative protection—religion,
political opinion, gender, race, disability—as well as those
additional groups covered by the Policy Appraisal and Fair Treatment
(PAFT) guidelines—age, marital status, dependants and sexual
orientation (paragraph 4.4). However, much of the discussion in
the White Paper concentrates on securing equality of opportunity
by religion. In the Council's view it is vital that the very necessary
attention given to this important issue should not obscure the
need for vigorous action on other important instances of group
differences in the labour market, not least in respect of gender.
REDUCING THE
UNEMPLOYMENT DIFFERENTIAL
Government has introduced the New Deal, an active
labour market programme, as a way of reducing long-term unemployment
throughout the UK. Northern Ireland, where this is much more of
a problem, has been allocated a number of places for 18-24 year
olds that reflects the extent of the problem regionally. Furthermore,
this was substantially augmented by the Chancellor's announcement
in May 1998 of up to 30,000 extra places in Northern Ireland for
those long-term unemployed aged 25 years and above. When combined
with an economy that will receive a considerable boost from the
prospect of peace and political stability, this suggests that
real reductions should take place in long-term unemployment in
Northern Ireland in the near and medium term.
While the White Paper concurs that unemployment
will fall, it is also rightly concerned that the Catholic/Protestant
unemployment ratio for men (2.2 in 1991) and women (1.8)—particularly
for those unemployed for more than a year, two thirds of whom
are Catholics—should be reduced. Indeed, the White Paper
specifically asks for benchmarks and benchmark measures for the
reduction of the differential (paragraph 2.22). The Council in
its report on resolving long-term unemployment of June 1997 put
forward a series of measures that should be considered in meeting
this objective. These measures included not only New Deal type
programmes but also reforms to the housing market, the educational
systems, public transport and the delivery of the job-search functions
of the T&EA and Social Security Agency.
Based on existing information and ideas, the
Council believes that it is important to move actively on measures
designed to lower unemployment, particularly long-term unemployment,
and to promote equality of opportunity as proposed in the White
Paper. However, further research should be undertaken, perhaps
by persons skilled in analysing black/white unemployment differentials
in the UK, US and elsewhere, to give a better understanding of
the dynamics of the labour market and, thus, the reasons for the
unemployment differential, leading perhaps to the identification
of further initiatives. Paragraph 2.21 recognises the difficulties
but even it may be too sanguine about the ability of the proposed
policies to erode the differential.
The White Paper was obviously proposed prior
to the Good Friday Agreement. The Government will no doubt be
considering what adjustments are needed in order to give full
effect to that Agreement.
18 June 1998
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