1. Background
The Company is committed to the principle of equal opportunity in employment. This means that we are committed to ensure within the framework of the law that our workplace is free from unlawful discrimination because of race, nationality, ethnic or national origin, colour, sex, pregnancy, maternity, breast feeding, marital status or civil partnership, religion or belief, age, disability, sexual orientation, gender reassignment, part-time or fixed-term status, trade union activities or any other unlawful criteria. All the Company’s staff have a right to be treated in a non-discriminatory fashion, not only employees, but also workers, contractors and agency staff.

The terms equality , inclusion and diversity are at the hear of this policy.
Equality means ensuring everyone has the same opportunities to fulfil their potential free from discrimination. Inclusion means ensuring everyone feels comfortable to be themselves at work and feels the worth of their contribution. Diversity means the celebration of individual differences amongst the workforce. We will actively support diversity and inclusion and ensure that all our employees are valued and treated with dignity and respect. We want to encourage everyone in our Company to reach their potential.
We aim to ensure that our staff achieve their full potential and that all employment decisions are taken without reference to irrelevant or discriminatory criteria. We have adopted this policy as a means of helping to achieve these aims.
Breaches of this policy will be taken very seriously by the Company as a disciplinary matter.

2. Who is responsible?
Managers and supervisors are responsible for implementing this policy and for applying it during their day to day management.
All employees have a responsibility not to unlawfully discriminate against all other staff working for and with the Company, whether or not they are employees of the Company. Employees must report any behaviour which could amount to unlawful discrimination of which they become aware, whether it is aimed at them or someone else and whether the discrimination comes from a member of staff or an outside person.
Employees with a disability should inform the Human Resources Department if they consider that any adjustments need to be made to accommodate their condition in the work environment.

3. Forms of discrimination
Direct discrimination occurs where someone is put at a disadvantage on discriminatory grounds in relation to his or her employment. Direct discrimination may occur even when unintentional.
Indirect discrimination occurs where the individual’s employment is subject to an unjustified provision, criterion or practice which affects all staff, but puts one group of staff at a particular disadvantage.
Victimisation occurs where an individual is treated less favourably than colleagues because he/she has taken action to assert their statutory rights or assisted a colleague in doing so.
Harassment is unwanted conduct which has the purpose or the effect of violating another person’s dignity or creating an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment for him or her. This includes unwanted conduct of a sexual nature and detrimental treatment as a result of rejecting or submitting to this unwanted conduct. It can involve actions, omissions, behaviour, words, gossip or physical contact.
Disability discrimination may occur where an individual is disadvantaged in employment/recruitment because of a disability or for a reason connected with it. It also occurs when there is a failure to make reasonable adjustments to accommodate a disability in the workplace.
There may be limited circumstances justifying different treatment, which means that the treatment is not unlawful.
Unlawful discrimination can occur where it is a third party who has the protected characteristic. For example, offensive comments about a client’s age; offensive comments to a colleague because they look after a person with a disability.

4. Employment procedures
Recruitment and selection
All recruitment and selection will be on the basis of basis of merit alone with no unlawful discrimination.
Employment conditions, facilities and services
Terms and conditions of employment, facilities and services will be offered to employees fairly and, where appropriate, differentials will be on the basis of merit. No discriminatory factors will unlawfully be taken into account.
Part-time and fixed term employees will not be subject to unlawful discrimination in the terms and conditions of employment which they are offered.
The Human Resources Department will consider whether any adjustments should be made to the terms and conditions of employment of employees with a disability to accommodate their condition.
Training, transfer and promotion
Training, transfer and promotion will be offered to staff on the basis of objective criteria, without consideration of factors which would constitute unlawful discrimination.
The Human Resources Department will consider whether any employees with a disability require extra training to accommodate their condition in the work environment.
Staff will be given appropriate training in the implementation of this policy, depending on their role within the Company.
Termination of employment
The Human Resources Department will monitor redundancy criteria and procedures to ensure that they are fair and objective and do not directly or indirectly unlawfully discriminate against employees.
Disciplinary and competence procedures will be carried out fairly and uniformly. If appropriate, reasonable adjustments will be made for employees with a disability in
implementing these procedures. Working environment
All staff working for the Company have the right to be treated with dignity and respect. The Company will take all steps it can to do this. Employees are expected to help prevent discrimination in the workplace.
The Company will not tolerate harassment of fellow workers. Harassment can take the form of verbal abuse, insensitive comments or intended “jokes”, inappropriate emails and other written materials, comments posted on networking websites and inappropriate treatment of colleagues. It can take place in the workplace and outside the workplace. Workers may find a comment objectionable where it does not refer to their own characteristics, but those of another person, for example, a client or a dependent of an employee.
Family friendly working practices
Working patterns will be reviewed, where possible, so as to enable the Company to offer flexible working to staff with childcare responsibilities.

5. No victimisation
Employees will not be victimised for raising complaints of unlawful discrimination or for supporting colleagues who do so.

6. Enforcement
Breaches of this policy will be viewed as a disciplinary matter and may result in dismissal.

7. Monitoring this procedure
The Human Resources Department will review the effectiveness of this policy from time to time.

8. Raising a complaint or reporting an incident
If you have a complaint relating to unlawful discrimination, you should raise it through the Company’s Grievance Procedure.
If you have a complaint relating to harassment, you may first wish to try to address it informally by asking the person concerned to stop or asking a colleague to speak to the person on your behalf. If you prefer to deal with it formally, you should raise it through the procedure set out in the Company’s Grievance Procedure. You are encouraged to contact HR Department for advice and assistance at any point.
If you want to report an incidence of discrimination which you become aware of, without raising a complaint, you should do so to HR Department.