Equality Standard and Framework for Local Government
Equality Standard for Local Government
The Equality Standard for Local Government is
a tool for local authorities to ‘mainstream’ equality across
service delivery and employment.
Overall, the Standard specifies five levels of
achievement. The Council is currently at Level 3.
Level 3 requires authorities to have completed
a systematic equality impact assessment process of all policies,
procedures and practices. Where issues have been highlighted as a
result of this process, relevant objectives, targets and actions
should be set in service plans (or other appropriate plans) for
2008/09 & beyond. Effective mechanisms should be in place to
monitor performance on these actions and targets.
Equality Framework for Local Government
From April 2009, a revised version of the Equality Standard for
Local Government will come into use, called the Equality Framework
for Local Government. This new framework has been designed to link
into the forthcoming Single Equality Bill and the requirements of
the Comprehensive Area Assessment process.
The framework contains three levels, as opposed to the five
contained within the current standard. These three new levels
are:
Level 1 Emerging
Level 2 Achieving
Level 3 Excellent.
Existing Equality Standard scores will be fitted into the new
model. For Bedford Borough Council this means that our Level under
the Equality Standard translates to ‘achieving’ under the Equality
Framework