Letter fom the Parliamentary Under Secretary
of State for Work and Pensions (DDB 117)
Thank you for sending me the Committee's schedule
of suggestions and comments it has received on the Disability
Discrimination Bill You should by now have seen the Government
to response to each item.
The comments made on the detailed points raised
need to be seen in the context of the Government's broader strategy
for developing comprehensive civil rights for disabled people,
the timing of our implementation of this broader strategy and
role the draft Bill plays within this.
The proposed legislation does not implement
policy from afresh. We did not, as some of the evidence you have
received implies, approach the draft Bill with the intention of
excluding specific proposals. The draft Bill aims to fulfil a
specific Manifesto commitment and covers the implementation of
proposals making up that commitment. As you know, these proposals
follow directly on from the Disability Right's Task Force's recommendations
and the Government response in Towards Inclusion, which
fully set out and explained our approach. There are two areas
(around the coverage of volunteers and the ability of an Employment
Tribunal to order reinstatement or re-engagement) that we have
not taken forward, but I must emphasise that the main focus of
the draft Bill is to fulfil a very precise set of proposals to
complete a Manifesto commitment, adding to other legislative progress
we have made, including last year's Disability Discrimination
(Amendment) Regulations.
There are issues raised in the evidence you
have received that are not included in the draft Bill, because
they are not part of these earlier commitments. That is not to
say that at some time in the future such proposals will not be
considered, but, for the moment, these are proposals that we do
not believe are appropriate to the task in hand.
One reason for this is that 1 am very concerned
not to disrupt the activities of both Government and others to
improve understanding and awareness of our legislation as we take
forward a huge programme of implementation leading up to October
2004 and beyond. Significantly changing the underpinning concepts
of the Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) could severely undermine
the effective implementation of this important range of legislation.
I am anxious that those who have obligations,
or will shortly, can understand what they are. Changing key concepts
will undermine this understanding and may not produce the best
outcomes for disabled people. As you will be aware, from the evidence
you have received, while the DDA and its key concepts are increasingly
becoming familiar and subject to a good body of helpful case law,
there is still significant misunderstanding even around what is
currently in place, let alone the future changes.
There is, without question, a need to make significant
improvements to the original 1995 Act and this is what the wide
ranging measures taken in the previous session of Parliament,
in recent regulations and in this draft Bill achieve. It is premature,
however, to make fundamental changes to key concepts underpinning
the DDA, like the approach to defining discrimination and disability,
and the concept of reasonable adjustment (and, in particular,
the way that the triggers for reasonable adjustment work). The
existing and planned legislation needs more time to be understood
and to bed down thoroughly before we can draw accurate conclusions
on the case or priorities for further change or reform.
Finally, the draft Bill would actually achieve
much of what some respondents are suggesting it would not. Where
it already fulfils a policy intention either on a point of substance
or drafting, I have simply said so.
I look forward to appearing before the Committee
on 31 March when we can discuss some of these issues further.
Maria Eagle MP
March 2004
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