Thanks to Government support, a private members’ bill by the Lib Dem MP Wera Hobhouse to protect employees from third-party ‘harassment’ sailed through the Commons last week and is on its way to the Lords. Unfortunately, it poses a grave threat to free speech, writes Toby in the Spectator.
The difficulty arises because the legislation Hobhouse and the Government are proposing to amend is the Equality Act 2010. Among other things, this imposes a legal duty on employers to protect workers from harassment by other employees, defined as “unwanted conduct relating to a protected characteristic” (age, disability, gender reassignment, race, religion or belief, sex or sexual orientation) if that conduct has the purpose or effect of “creating an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment”. The bill will expand that duty so bosses will be liable for harassment of employees by members of the public they come into contact with while doing their jobs.
If we were just talking about sexual harassment, that would be one thing. But the bill extends third-party liability to every type of “unwanted conduct” prohibited by the Equality Act, including overheard comments. You may think I’m making that up, but in 2017 an employment tribunal awarded £1,000 to a former administrative assistant at the law firm Shoosmiths who was upset when she overheard another employee say “struggling immigrants should go back to their country”. The tribunal found it “reasonable” for the woman – an immigrant herself – to be upset, even though the remark wasn’t directed at her, and her harassment claim was upheld.
Such findings have poisoned the atmosphere in offices up and down the country, with employers frantically trying to limit their legal liability by banning an ever-expanding list of phrases, forcing staff to undergo ‘unconscious bias training’ and insisting they declare their preferred pronouns to curry favour with trans and non-binary employees. If the Hobhouse bill becomes law, this climate of fear will spread. Employers will have a duty to protect their workers from overhearing ‘upsetting’ remarks made not only by colleagues, but also by third parties.
This means, says Toby: “If a barmaid or stadium steward overhears something they find upsetting that relates to a protected characteristic, even if it isn’t addressed to them, they can still sue their employers for harassment.” This will lead owners to “inevitably start policing their customers’ speech”.
So much for the Tories’ war on woke, he concludes.
Worth reading in ful.
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Not my problem, I always thought that lockdowns were a terrible idea.
Confronting child abuse, in all its forms, should be everyone’s problem.
I’m completely past giving a fuck about anybody – the sheep backed lockdowns, this is on them,not me. That said, none of this is accidental, and will have been forseen, and accepted, by TPTB
You do know that whenever you do a ‘Victor Meldrew’ I’m going to troll you with the antidote for your condition don’t you?
https://twitter.com/shouldhaveanima/status/1686821775890595840
That all looks like food to me.
So this is what becomes of our apathetic, ovine capitulation to rules that never made any sense, even with respect to physical health or control of a pathogen. The rules were ostensibly in place to “flatten the curve” – even to “save lives”. The result: child abuse and deaths, and a virus that becomes stronger due to our lack of exposure to it and subsequent immunological naivety, along with greater vulnerability to many other viruses for the same reason!
Look, I’m getting extremely tired of this now, tired of the ongoing debate about how Lockdowns were bad.. Yes we knew and know they were an appalling way to treat a society in all forms and metrics.
Stop the debate and start talking about who is accountable, what punishments and how we can ensure this never ever happens again
What a surprise. One of many items that they didn’t think through when they went mad. Jot it down and present to the Inquiry.
One doubts that these deaths (and it does not seem to include other forms of domestic abuse) will even be considered by the “We-should-have-locked-down-sooner-and-harder” Covid Enquiry.
NSPCC, Children’s Services et al can go to hell. Lest we forget individuals in these roles were some of the most vocal advocates of lockdowns and the other Covid restrictions.
They were told of the risks to these children yet plowed on regardless.
The data for the following year and after will be coming out too but may not be linked to the lockdowns even though they should be – having worked in childcare especially with those at risk knew the precious little ones would be in danger but it fell on deaf ears – “home visits” done via zoom or not at all – are you kidding me
.
How many where children were flagged by a medical professional but did not have a home visit because of the Local Authority having new guidance and policies due to Covid measures?! How many where abuse was reported by family or neighbours in close proximity but these reports fell through the cracks?!
These deaths are just the tip of the iceberg. How many of these death cases also had siblings? One baby to be included in the 2022/23 died but had 4 siblings all experienced abuse but will not have their circumstances acknowledged as part of these figures…Another family again a sibling group of 5 one disabled in the home with a violent child among them. How about the children that were put into foster placements that did not have proper checks done as proper safeguarding went out the window due to covid – child placement with a foster carer that sexually abused her…
These poor children were murdered by their evil parents/step-parents/guardians ….. but that murder was facilitated by:
SAGE
Prof Neil Ferguson
The Quad: Johnson, Handcock, Gove and Sunak
Every MP who failed to even question the Government’s lockdown policy (that’s virtually all of them)
The Mainstream Media, who acted as cheerleaders for the murderous policy
All the above are accomplices to murder.