Clause 27 - Conciliation
Equality Bill [Lords]
1:00 pm
Meg Munn (Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Department of Trade and Industry; Sheffield, Heeley, Labour)
It is good to see you in the Chair again, Mrs. Anderson. I thank the hon. Gentleman for the amendment and will explain the scope of the commission’s power to arrange for the provision of conciliation services.
Conciliation is an important function of the commission. In an ideal world, litigation would be the last resort for equality proceedings. Disputes can often be settled through conciliation in less time, for less cost and with less disruption to the lives of the people involved. However, we believe that human rights proceedings should not fall within the scope of the commission’s conciliation work, for three main reasons.
First, the nature of proceedings under the Human Rights Act is that they are brought against a public authority, often an arm of government. They are usually brought by way of an application for judicial review by an individual or group of individuals, who must, of course, satisfy the victim test. The enactments specified in the clause, in relation to which the commission may arrange conciliation services, are civil proceedings in private law. Human rights proceedings, in contrast, are public law proceedings.
Such proceedings do not have the same absolute standard of legal conduct as found in the equality enactments. Instead, the court is asked to review the conduct, decision or policy of the public authority to assess whether it respects the framework of rights laid down by the Human Rights Act. It may also be asked to assess whether the public authority has acted in a way that is not irrational or unreasonable. Such a review could not appropriately be carried out in conciliation, especially when the parties are likely to be of unequal strength, as in the case of an individual and a public authority.
Secondly, it is good practice for public authorities to have procedures available whereby those who are unhappy with the authority’s conduct or decision may seek a review within the organisation. Hon. Members will be aware of other enactments that require complaints procedures and so on to be in place. That is not only good practice; the public authority can save the legal costs of fighting an action in court if it can, within the organisation, provide a suitable means by which a complainant can achieve redress. If public authorities do not put such procedures in place—the promotion of the procedures would fall within the commission’s duty to promote good practice in relation to human rights—a further external conciliation procedure is likely to add little value.
Finally, that brings me back to our decision that the CEHR should not be asked to support litigation arising solely under the Human Rights Act 1998. We are concerned that a power to support human rights litigation could overload the commission, with the need to sift through many and varied applications for support.