The Race Relations (Amendment) Act (2000), the Disability Discrimination Act (2005) and the Equality Act (2006) introduced a positive duty on all public sector organisations that requires institutions (including Universities) to be pro-active in their promotion of equality ensuring no individual or group is directly or indirectly discriminated against. These duties specify that impact assessments of all new and existing policies, procedures and practices are the way in which these requirements should be met. Impact assessments are intended to assess what if any differential impact is experienced by certain equality target areas.

The proposed Single Equality Act which is due in March / April 2010 will replace the existing separate equality duties on public authorities covering race, disability and gender by a single equality duty that extends to gender reassignment, age, sexual orientation and religion or belief.

In response to this legislation the University has recommended that the impact of all new and existing policies, procedures, guidelines and processes should be assessed in relation to age, disability, gender, gender reassignment, nationality, race, religion or belief and sexual orientation.

A series of involvement and consultation activities with staff and students have enabled the prioritisation of the University's functions.

A policy pro forma/initial screening form has been developed for all existing and proposed policies allowing equality relevance to be assessed. If equality relevance is established the policy is included within the full equality impact assessment timetable.

Policy owners work with the Equality and Diversity team and in consultation with key stakeholders to ensure that policies do not have an adverse effect on specified equality groups, as well as highlighting where there is potential to promote where the policy can have a positive effect on equality groups. Included in the assessment is an analysis of data (where available) by equality group and consultation with equality staff network groups and other relevant members of staff/students at the University.

An equality impact assessment pilot project has been completed where key policies have been assessed in areas such as Human Resources, Student Support, Teaching Learning and Assessment, Student Recruitment and International Development and Procurement.

This pilot has allowed the University to develop an effective approach to equality impact assessments. In addition a series of guidance documents and training sessions have been developed to support senior managers carry out assessments in their areas.

A copy of the University's Equality Impact Assessment Guidance is available to download from the University's Equality and Diversity Intranet pages www.campus.manchester.ac.uk/equalityanddiversity

The University's Grievance Policy is owned by the Directorate of Human Resources.

This function area has been identified as a high priority area. Therefore an equality impact assessment timetable has been outlined and put in place.

A working group has been established in Human Resources to take forward equality impact assessments of all Human Resources polices.

This group includes representatives from the department of Policy and Employee Engagement, Faculty Human Resources Teams, the Equality and Diversity Team and Staff Trade Unions.

In consultation with this group and using the University's initial screening pro-forma / form the potential equality outcome for this policy has been identified as high.

The equality impact of the University's Grievance Policy is due to undergo a full assessment during the academic year 2009/10.