Debate contribution: Fair Employment (Monitoring) (Amendment) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2024
Debate contribution by Mrs Pam Cameron on .
- MLA
- Mrs Pam Cameron
- Party at the time
- Democratic Unionist Party
- Date
- 11 November 2024
- Type
- Debate contribution (made as a minister)
- Business
- Executive Committee Business
- Heading
- Fair Employment (Monitoring) (Amendment) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2024
- Assembly identifier
- Official Report component 4667777
Read the official Assembly record
Text
I beg to move
Today, we seek the Assembly's approval for the Fair Employment (Monitoring) (Amendment) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2024. It might be useful to Members for me to begin by setting out the principal considerations that informed the preparation of the statutory rule (SR). The Executive Office proposes to make a statutory rule under powers conferred by article 53 of the Fair Employment and Treatment (Northern Ireland) Order 1998 or "FETO", to amend the Fair Employment (Monitoring) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 1999. The statutory rule is subject to draft affirmative resolution before the Assembly. It is substantively an administrative matter and will amend the monitoring regulations to require existing registered concerns, including public authorities, to provide monitoring information in respect of schoolteachers from 12 May 2024 only. That is the date on which the school teachers exception in the Fair Employment and Treatment (Northern Ireland) Order 1998 was removed by the commencement of the Fair Employment (School Teachers) Act (Northern Ireland) 2022. Without the amendment, some schools could be in technical breach of the monitoring regulations. The monitoring regulations currently require employers to provide 12 months of data to the Equality Commission for Northern Ireland on the anniversary of their initial registration. The Fair Employment (School Teachers) Act (Northern Ireland) 2022 does not provide for the collation of the 12 months of teachers' data needed for the first return that follows the removal of the schoolteachers exception. The monitoring regulations state that failure to provide a return containing the required information is an offence. To ensure that employers are able to provide the required monitoring data and not be potentially subject to a fine, there is a need to amend the monitoring regulations. The purpose of this statutory rule, therefore, is to amend the reporting requirements so that the existing registered concerns do not need to supply information relating to schoolteachers prior to 12 May 2024 only. We thank the Committee for the Executive Office for its prompt scrutiny of the regulations.
We are grateful to the Chair and the Member for their contributions to the debate. I will update the Chair of the Committee on the point about the Equality Commission. On the wider issue of the implementation of the Fair Employment (School Teachers) Act (Northern Ireland) 2022, the Equality Commission has submitted a business case to the Department in respect of additional staff costs, as outlined. The requirement to monitor teachers that flows from the Act is new work, and the scale and volume of the task required is not yet clear. The vast majority of schools are already registered for fair employment monitoring processes and report through the Education Authority or the Council for Catholic Maintained Schools, which can provide advice and guidance to member schools.
It is not yet clear what additional burden will fall on the Equality Commission for Northern Ireland. The Department is extremely mindful of the current financial climate and the likelihood of additional funds being available centrally to meet the new need. The Department has asked the commission to look at ways of meeting the new requirement by reallocating funds from other work. In addition, in considering the commission's business case, the Department asked the commission for an analysis of tasks in the business case that could be conducted at a reduced level and tasks that were unachievable without additional resource. The Department has received that analysis and is actively considering it. The First Minister and deputy First Minister have agreed to the internal reallocation of £298,000 to the Equality Commission for Northern Ireland to cover staffing cost pressures. That funding is not directly related to Fair Employment (School Teachers) Act (Northern Ireland) 2022 work or the associated business case, but the commission has welcomed the funding, and TEO has asked the Department of Finance to note the proposed adjustment to its budget lines. That is by way of information. The Executive Office will continue to assess the implementation of the Fair Employment (School Teachers) Act (Northern Ireland) 2022 as the monitoring process continues. These regulations will provide a helpful transitional arrangement for the new monitoring arrangements for school teachers. We thank Members for the support for the regulations that was signalled in the debate today and in their consideration by the Committee for the Executive Office, and I commend them to the Assembly.
722 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.
Assessment
Awaiting analysis
This record has not been analysed yet. It is not counted in any total until it has been assessed.
Disagree with this assessment?
Classifications can be challenged. A person reviews every challenge, and any change is recorded publicly above with its reason.