29 June 2010
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Make sure the cuts are fair


Neil Kinghan

Neil Kinghan urges local authorities to ensure they use equality-impact assessments to measure the effect of downsizing.

How can we make budget cuts fairly? It is a question which demands the attention of all of those running public sector bodies, not least of chief executives and council leaders.

We are told that the forthcoming review of the UK’s finances and public services will be like no other in recent history. The business secretary has said that it’s not just about slicing away at existing structures. It’s about rethinking those structures from scratch.

This is, of course, familiar territory for local authorities. Many have been pioneering approaches, such as back-office rationalisation, shared budgets and co-design and delivery of services for years. They have shown it is possible both to save money and transform services.

But all public authorities will need to increase the pace in coming years, and even the most ardent believers in the power of reform would admit that, with the likely scale of cuts, there will be losers as well as winners.

The risk is that the costs will fall most heavily on those who can afford it least. Take restraint in public sector pay and employment. The public sector is more than three-fifths female. Will women feel the impact more keenly?

Or take welfare reform. Disabled people, and people from some ethnic minority backgrounds, are less likely to be in employment than average. Will reform be designed so as to ensure that these groups can access support in a reasonable way? This is why equality impact assessment – considering the likely effects of reform on different groups – is particularly important now. Impact assessment is not an optional extra. Nor is it politically correct window dressing. It enables public bodies to make better decisions.

Local authorities are under a statutory duty to measure the impact of their decisions on different groups with regard to race, gender and disability. A wider duty to consider age, religion or belief and sexual orientation is set to come into force next year.

But this is not just something the law requires. It is a positive opportunity to improve policy-making.

It means that difficult decisions are taken in the light of proper evidence. It helps ensure that good intentions translate into good outcomes, and without unintended consequences. And it underpins good use of taxpayers’ money, so that public services genuinely meet the needs of everyone.

We in the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC), as guardians of the Equality Act 2006, want to help central and local government get impact assessment right. We have written to the Treasury, the Cabinet Office and the Audit Commission to remind them of their duties, and the duties of the organisations they oversee. And advice and guidance is available through our website.

Here, for example, are some starters for 10:

Think about equality at the beginning of the process. Attempting to shoe-horn in equality considerations at the last minute won’t do. You will miss opportunities to consult properly and consider alternative approaches. You may also lay yourself open to legal challenge

Involve people. There is an explicit requirement to consult different groups under race relations law but, as a matter of best practice, you should apply the same principle to other groups. No-one can give you a better insight into how proposed changes will affect, for example, disabled people, than disabled people themselves be prepared to modify your plans. Insistence on impact assessment is not an excuse to prevent reform. In some cases, you might think that the imperative of cutting costs is an overriding justification for some disproportionate impact on some groups. However, where that impact would amount to unlawful discrimination, you must alter your plans. And in other instances, you may choose to tweak policy, or take mitigating measures

Don’t make it an unnecessarily bureaucratic exercise. The quality of an impact assessment does not depend on the number of pages. What matters most is the thought, analysis and action put into the process

Think about the overall impact. It is important to assess the impact of reform in individual policy areas – but what about the aggregate effect? It would be best practice to carry out an overall assessment of the impact of local cuts and reorganisations, to make sure the same group or groups aren’t losing out time and again.

I hope that you will visit the EHRC website and find out more.

Helping to secure local consent for cuts and reforms will be part of the job for many in local government in years to come. These cuts will be delivered more effectively, and with greater value for public money, when they are backed up by thorough analysis and transparent discussion.

What is more, it will be a great deal easier to explain decisions which are, and are seen to be, equitable and fair.

Neil Kinghan is acting director general of the Equality and Human Rights Commission



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