Department for Education policy paper and call for evidence: Review of Children in Need
16 March 2018
The Department for Education has launched a March 2018 review of support for children in need.
The Department for Education has launched a March 2018 review of support for children in need.
‘The UK is one of the most unequal countries in the developed world’ says the March 2018 Equality Trust manifesto.
‘Banks have to check applicants’ immigration status before allowing them to open a bank account’.
This is according to the February 2018 briefing (pdf) from Global Justice Now on the hostile environment for immigrants.
The briefing finds:
The government is preventing people from accessing safe and secure housing by forcing landlords to carry out the work of immigration officers.
NHS staff are also being forced to demand upfront payment for treatment from people who cannot prove their immigration status
People in the UK without at least six months leave to remain cannot apply for a driving licence
Read the full report (pdf).
The Scottish Affairs Committee have launched a March 2018 inquiry on the impact of Brexit on trade and investment in Scotland.
‘The impact of changes to direct taxes and benefits is to reduce the income of
Bangladeshi households by around £4,400 per year on average’.
Four months after releasing their 2017 interim report, the Equality and Human Rights Commission have published their final cumulative impact assessment (pdf), in March 2018.
The report exposes how much individuals and households are expected to gain or lose, and how many adults and children will fall below an adequate standard of living, as a result of recent changes to taxes and social security.
The report finds:
Negative impacts are particularly large for households with more disabled members, and individuals with more severe disabilities, as well as for lone parents on low incomes
For some family types, these losses represent over 13% of average net income
At an individual level, women lose on average considerably more from changes to direct taxes and benefits than men
Lone parents in the bottom fifth of the household income distribution lose around 25% of their net income, on average
Around 1.5 million more children are forecast to be living in households below the relative poverty line as a result of the reforms.
EDF and a number of our members have contributed to the development of this important research.
Read the full report (pdf).
57% of people in poverty are children or working-age adults living in a household where someone is in paid work.
This is according to a March 2018 briefing from the Institute for Fiscal Studies on poverty and low pay in the UK.
The briefing finds:
Low pay is highly related to lack of pay progression. The wages of the low- and high- educated, and of men and women, end up much further apart by age 40 than they were at the start of their careers
Experience and education are both positively associated with higher wages, but the association with experience is much stronger for the high-educated than the low-educated
The fact that women’s wages fall behind their male counterparts over the lifecycle is, in part, related to a remarkable lack of wage progression in part-time work.
Read the full briefing.
The Equality and Human Rights Commission has assessed the progress on socioeconomic rights in Great Britain since 2016.
6 in 10 employers agree that a woman should have to disclose whether she is pregnant during the recruitment process.
This is according to the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) who have published the results of their survey on maternity discrimination in the workplace, in February 2018.
The aim of the survey was to understand managers’ attitudes around pregnancy and maternity discrimination.
Findings from the survey include:
44% of employers agree that women should work for an organisation for at least a year before deciding to have children
40% of employers claim to have seen at least one pregnant woman in their workplace ‘take advantage’ of their pregnancy
41% employers agreed that pregnancy in the workplace puts ‘an unnecessary cost burden’ on the workplace.
EHRC have also launched a February 2018 campaign to combat these negative perceptions and end discrimination against new parents. Working Forward asks businesses to join the campaign and make the pledge.
Read the research report.
Find out on the Working Forward campaign.
The Equality and Human Rights Commission have published their response to the consultation on the changes to teaching of sex and relationship education, and PSHE, in February 2018.
The Equality and Human Rights Commission recommends:
Schools should take a rights-based approach to the whole-school environment, by addressing all subjects from the perspective of ensuring respect for individuals’ human rights
The Department for Education should improve training and guidance for teachers so that they can more comprehensively consider the needs of all pupils
When faced with requests to withdraw, schools should ask parents to state in writing their reasons for wishing to withdraw their child.
Read the full response.
Our February 2018 report, Shared Prosperity, Shared Rights, makes the case for an effective replacement of EU funding that supports equality and human rights.