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Phillips outlines new equality watchdog plan
Outlining his plans to address a range of "explosive" social battlegrounds, Trevor Phillips has said the new Equality and Human Rights Commission is determined to make the case for a human rights culture.
The EHRC, which officially began its work on Monday, brings together the roles previously filed by the Disability Rights Commission, the Commission for Racial Equality and the Equal Opportunities Commission.
The watchdog has responsibility for enforcing equality legislation on age, disability, gender, race, religion or belief, sexual orientation and transgender status, and will also promote human rights.
Phillips, the EHRC chairman, said that the workplace is likely be a key area for addressing many of the issues within his organisation's remit.
'Minefields'
Speaking to ePolitix.com to mark the launch of the body, Phillips said that the public feel strongly about issues such as the pay gap or the position of disabled people.
"And that's before we get onto the new ground of, let's say, the relationship between religious institutions and their attitudes towards sexual orientation; and then eventually we have the territory of old versus young, should we spend more on the older population or is that at the expense of the young?" he asked this website.
"The point is we are going to be dealing with a range of issues which we already know are explosive. The reason these things are so friction-laden is because as a society we haven't yet found ways of dealing with some of these issues of difference.
"Now the first thing in dealing with them is social justice because people are never going to agree if some people feel they're always going to be treated as second-class citizens.
"But more than that, part of our job is to try and get different kinds of people to understand each other better, to talk to each other more, and that's hard when there are already these frictions.
"So in a sense, we are standing right in the middle of some really difficult, explosive battlegrounds. We are in the midst of a minefield really, and it is our job to start clearing the mines."
Bill of rights
On the issue of whether there should be a 'British Bill of Rights', Phillips said he would be "happy to engage in the debate".
But he added that "there is absolutely nothing wrong with the Human Rights Act, we don't need to interfere with it and we don't need to muck about with it".
A new Bill of Rights could help to develop the ground rules for a fairer society, he said.
Practical steps such as showing how the Act is on the side of ordinary people who are being "bullied by authority" could address negative perceptions, Phillips argued.
Emphasis
In his interview with ePolitix, Phillips also said the commission would be looking at whether institutions are "fair to everybody".
"It might sound abstract, but if you are thinking about a hospital, a hospital that pays attention to every individual as an individual will be treating older people or ethnic minority people fairly because they'll be giving every individual a better service," he said.
There will also be a "change of emphasis" as the EHRC replaces its predecessor bodies.
"We're not going to abandon casework but we're going to put a lot more energy into stopping discrimination happening before it takes place," said Phillips.
"Hopefully that means we have to put less resources into getting people compensation after they have been hurt.
"The essential point here is that although it is important there are remedies, it is even more important to stop people doing the things that force you to employ those remedies."
Workplace
Phillips added that there would be work to "establish what are the really big battlegrounds".
"It's pretty clear I think, and we'll be saying more about this, that the workplace has to be the central place where we mount our big charge, if I can put it that way, to improve life chances and so on," he said.
"But over and above that I think we need to start telling what people in politics now call 'new narratives'. We need to get people to understand equality and human rights in a different way.
"In the case of equality we need to get people to understand that equality is not about special interests but its in everybody's interests.
"And in the case of human rights it's not about a small number of people who are in some way taking advantage of the rest of us, but human rights are really about the ground rules for a fairer society and once again that's in everybody's interests."
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