2 days ago
Equality Act fuels massive rise in race discrimination cases
The Equality Act has fuelled a massive rise in racial discrimination tribunals, a report has found.
The number of employment tribunals debating a claim of racial discrimination has tripled since 2017, while the proportion of successful claims has remained static.
The campaign group Don't Divide Us said it proved that the Equality Act was contributing significantly to a divided Britain.
The organisation's report found that the number of tribunal applications for race discrimination cases had shot up from 165 in 2016-17 to 1,201 in 2023-24 – a seven-fold increase.
The number of cases reaching tribunals rose from 285 to 829 over the same period.
But over the whole period, just 5 per cent of claims were successful – and this figure has remained relatively static.
Dr Alka Sehgal Cuthbert, the campaign group's director, and lead author of the report, said the Equality Act undermined English case law and contributed to a grievance culture in which people resorted to 'lawfare' to resolve petty disputes and imagined slights.
'The Equality Act has achieved the exact opposite of its stated aim, making the UK a less tolerant and less equal place,' she said.
'It provides the legal scaffolding that supports this surge in workplace discrimination claims, the overwhelming majority of which have been found groundless.
'Instead of bringing greater fairness, equality, and harmony, the Equality Act has been a major vector for curtailing the fundamental freedoms for citizens to speak their mind, and to appear before the law as equal.
'As we examine in our case studies and analysis section, the Act has handed inordinate power to those making malicious and bogus claims, or to thin-skinned people wilfully misinterpreting perfectly innocent comments or interactions.'
The Equality Act was passed in 2010 in the dying weeks of Gordon Brown's Labour government.
It allowed people to take forward claims for discrimination if they had one of nine protected characteristics, which includes race.
Don't Divide Us called on the Government to consider repealing the Equality Act. Their report found that, despite the huge increase in tribunals, the vast majority of cases fail.
Between 2017 and 2024, the proportion of cases which were upheld fluctuated from 4 per cent to 7 per cent.
Group calls for Act's repeal
Anna Loutfi, an equality and human rights barrister who co-authored the report, said the Equality Act was a 'spectacularly unsuccessful attempt at social engineering by the state' which undermines centuries of English common law.
'The Equality Act's prioritisation of subjective rather than objective tests is contributing to increasing fractiousness in workplace culture and relationships,' she said.
'Far from reducing racial tension and disparity, the Act and its offshoots, including the Public Sector Equality Duty and Positive Action programmes, are entrenching division.
'In pivoting the law away from prohibiting discrimination towards ensuring ill-defined equality', the EA 2010 has opened the door to political engineering.
'The Act was never oriented towards the pursuit of racial equality; instead, it has driven a 'mission creep' of continuously expanding rights, which has the opposite effect from that intended.
'We urge the Government to conduct a review into the Equality Act 2010, with a view to eventual repeal.'
