Clause 80 - Regulations
Equality Bill [Lords]
9:30 am
Meg Munn (Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Department of Trade and Industry; Sheffield, Heeley, Labour)
As the hon. Member for Beaconsfield has said, the effect of the amendment would be to require the sexual orientation regulations to do all the things listed in clause 80(3)(a) to (i). That would be undesirable. If we were to carry out our consultation in that context, our hands would be tied with regard to the outcome. I should not like that to happen. As an approach to developing new regulation, it would not meet the most basic better regulation test that secondary legislation should be brought forward only where it is necessary and appropriate.
To respond to my hon. Friend the Member for Hove (Ms Barlow), I said earlier, as she acknowledged, that we aim to introduce these regulations together with those on religion and belief. That reflects the approach that was taken in relation to employment regulations. Our target date for that is October 2006. She is right to raise the issue of the response of businesses, whoever their customers are. That is one of the categories that we want to ensure has the opportunity to comment on the consultation. I do not want to set out a more specific timetable at this point because that would be unhelpful in that it would tie our hands. Everybody on all sides is seeking the same outcome, so it would not be sensible to do that. However, we are aware that it is already December 2005, so the processes need to commence very shortly.
On my hon. Friend's comments about the need for comprehensive and robust regulations, we must aim for the best regulations that we can have. The opportunities that are presented by the discrimination law review, which is well under way, enable us to continue to keep all matters under review. We can consider them as we work to develop a simple but comprehensive framework that will cover all groups. I am sure that hon. Members will agree that it cannot be right to limit our options in a significant manner at this stage—that would be to deny ourselves the opportunity to produce properly targeted regulations that are likely to be effective in addressing the sort of discrimination that we want to use this order-making power to tackle.
I hope that hon. Members will agree that a key advantage of the order-making power in clause 80 is that it allows us to address the issue of sexual orientation discrimination at the earliest possible opportunity, without denying us the opportunity to take the time needed to explore and resolve fully the complex issues that arise in this area before detailed proposals for legislation are introduced. I appreciate the way in which the hon. Member for Beaconsfield spoke to the amendment, but I ask him to withdraw it.