Unapproved Minutes
UNIVERSITY OF ESSEX
EQUALITY AND DIVERSITY COMMITTEE
12 May 2011
(2– 4pm)
DRAFT MINUTES
Chair
Mrs Rosy Stamp
Present
Miss Rachel Earle, Mrs Sue Endean, Ms Rachel Fletcher, Ms Angela Jones, Mr Colin
McAuley , Prof Peter Patrick, Ms Hannah Prime
Secretary
Ms Karen Bush
In attendance
Ms Marianne Provan, Mrs Karen Stephenson
APOLOGIES
Noted
The Chair noted that apologies had been received from Mr Neil Barnard, Dr
Wayne Campbell, Mr Syd Kent, Mr Saeed Mohammed, Prof Colin Riordan, Dr
Kate Rockett, Prof Jane Wright
MINUTES OF THE MEETING HELD ON 8 February 2011
Approved
MATTERS ARISING FROM THE MINUTES
Noted
No matters arising.
MEMBERSHIP AND TERMS OF REFERENCE (Paper EADC/10/38)
Agreed
The terms of reference should include the following ‘to provide governance and
strategic oversight of the Harassment Advisory Network’.
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Noted
Judith Judd, an external member of Council, will succeed Mrs Stamp as Chair of
EADC. Her term of office is 1/8/2011 to 31/7/2014. The appointment of a Dean
and a Head of Department is still pending. Post-meeting note: Dr David Pevalin,
Dean of the Faculty of Science and Engineering and Dr Alison Rowlands,
forthcoming Head of the Department of History will also become members of
EADC for the period 1/8/2011 to 31/7/2014
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Noted
Ms Hannah Prime’s term as the student member elected by the Students’ Union
Council has ended.
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Post-meeting note: It was agreed that Ms Karen Bush, Human Resources Policy
and Projects Officer should become a member of the committee with immediate
effect and Mrs Karen Stephenson should take over as Committee Secretary.
Action
The Committee Secretary to make the changes to the Membership and Terms of
Reference noted above and submit them to Council for approval in July 2011.
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Action
Ms Provan to inform the Committee Secretary of the new Students’ Union
representatives.
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MATTERS ARISING FROM THE MINUTES
a) Caring Responsibilities Project (M.02/11)
Reported
Ms Fletcher reported that she has now submitted a Budget request to
Professional Services and if it is approved, the project can move forward. Ms
Fletcher and Ms Bush had met and agreed that ownership of the project should
sit with Equality and Diversity as the project will cover both staff and students
and that a detailed project plan and job description for the Project Officer should
be written.
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Action
Ms Bush to prepare a detailed project plan and a job description for the Project
Officer.
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b) Equality Act 2010 (M.11/11) (EADC/10/39)
Reported
Ms Bush reported that the general duties contained within the Public Sector
Equality Duty (PSED) came into force in April 2011. The specific duties have not
come into force and have been put back out for consultation. In addition, the
dual discrimination provision has been repealed and the third party harassment
provisions are also likely to be repealed in July 2011.
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Reported
Section 159 of the Act: Positive action in the recruitment of staff.
Ms Bush presented the paper on behalf of Mr Kent who proposed that the
University should not adopt this measure which permits an employer to take a
protected characteristic into consideration when deciding who to recruit or
promote, where people with the protected characteristic are at a disadvantage or
are under-represented.
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Agreed
The Committee agreed to Mr Kent’s proposal not to adopt Section 159 with the
proviso that the decision is reviewed in a year’s time, when Human Resources
will be looking at Recruitment statistics. This item will be put on the agenda of
the May 2012 meeting
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Action
Ms Bush to put this item on agenda for the May 2012 meeting.
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c) Options for providing a mediation service - progress (M.20/11)
Reported
Mrs Endean reported that options for providing an in-house and an external
mediation service were being explored. UCEA and ACAS both run accredited
mediation training and costs for these have been obtained. Ms Bush has
attended an initial briefing session run by Total Conflict Management (TCM)
who offer a range of options from providing a full external service to running a
range of both accredited and non-accredited training courses. A representative
from TCM, is due to deliver a presentation to HR in July after which a
recommendation as to the preferred option will be made to USG.
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Noted
Ms Fletcher pointed out that students would benefit from this service and that a
cross-organisation arrangement should be considered.
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Action
Mrs Endean to identify the preferred option and present a costed proposal to
USG.
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d) Recruitment of HAN advisers (M.22/11)
Reported
This round of recruitment is open to staff and students who teach.
26 people have shown an interest with 16 firm applications. Interviews to take
place on 7, 8 and 9 June.
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Noted
Ms Bush and Mrs Stephenson facilitated a session on ‘A Day in the Life of a
Harassment Adviser’ during the University’s Learning at Work Day. This was
very successful with 19 attendees out of which 6 people applied to be advisers.
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Recruitment of Student advisers will take place next year on a trial basis.
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e) EIR on Annual Review Procedures for Academic and Research staff (M.34/11) (Paper
EADC/10/40)
Reported
The Panel has been set up and Ms Bush has briefed the Chair and Secretary
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REVISED EQUALITY POLICY AND STRATEGY (M.12/11) (Paper EADC/10/41)
Reported
The revised Equality Policy and Strategy was approved by USG to go forward
for wider consultation with minor wording changes. During the six-week
consultation period, the only comment received was a suggested re-wording of
the ‘Introducing Essex’ section by the Internal Communications Officer.
59/11
Noted
The development of a Charter is part of the Policy’s action plan. The Dignity and
Respect Group have already produced a draft Charter and Equality and
Diversity, as part of the consultation on it, have fed in their views. Staff and
students will be encouraged to sign the Charter but are not obliged to do so.
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Agreed
The Charter should be written in such a way so as to encourage people to sign
up to it. The Charter will not be linked to any disciplinary procedure and the fact
that someone has signed it or not, will not be taken into account when
considering appropriate disciplinary action.
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Approved
The Equality Policy and Strategy was approved to go forward to Council in July
2011 for final approval.
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Action
Ms Bush to put the Equality and Policy Strategy forward to Council for approval.
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FEEDBACK FROM MEETING WITH STONEWALL REPRESENTATIVE (M.09/11)
(Paper EADC/10/42)
Reported
Ms Bush and Mr Kent met with a Stonewall representative and were convinced
that becoming a Stonewall Diversity Champion would be a very positive thing for
the University.
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Recommended
The University join the Stonewall Diversity Champions’ Programme on a one
year trial basis in the first instance.
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Agreed
The University should join the Stonewall Diversity Champions Programme with
immediate effect and find out if it can be done in partnership with the Students’
Union. Ms Provan agreed that if this was possible, the Students’ Union would
contribute financially.
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Action
Ms Bush to find out if the membership could cover the Students’ Union in
addition to the University.
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Action
Mr Kent to seek University funding for the first year’s membership.
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EIR ON PROGRESS AND RETENTION OF UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS - FINAL REPORT
(M.32/11) (Paper EADC/10/43)
Noted
The committee noted the findings of the Panel and how it complements work
that is already ongoing. In particular, the University has recently focussed on
this issue as part of its Access Agreement. The Panel’s report suggests that
those at risk of withdrawing are drawn from a broad range of students but it
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didn’t identify any particular group of students as being at a more significant risk
than others. The committee agreed it would be helpful if those with caring
responsibilities could be identified in order to assess whether this group of
students experience particular disadvantage.
The committee also acknowledged the difficulty the Panel had in obtaining
relevant data. This will be addressed as part of an action under the Equality
Policy and Strategy to identify what data should be collected for equality
monitoring purposes. It is also being considered by the Quality Assurance and
Enhancement Committee, as is the issue of encouraging students to discuss
their intermission, withdrawal or any other such process with their department.
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Agreed
The Equality Opportunities Monitoring form for students should be updated to
include a question about caring responsibilities. The issue of retention and
progression should also be included in the Caring Responsibilities project.
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Noted
Progress on the recommendations in the report will be reported to EADC in May
2012.
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Action
Ms Fletcher to speak to Dr Campbell about the inclusion of a caring
responsibilities question on the Equality Opportunities Monitoring form.
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Action
Ms Bush to include the issue of student retention and progression in the Caring
Responsibilities project.
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DISABILITY MATTERS
Agreed
The Access Forum should report annually to EADC, each February.
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STAFF STATISTICS
Noted
Mrs Endean explained that the implementation of the new IHR system left HR
with no functionality to produce staff statistics. As discussed in previous
meetings and in line with the work of the new Data Analysis group, the next set
of staff statistics will be accompanied by an analysis of the data.
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ANY OTHER BUSINESS
Noted
Mrs Endean expressed her thanks to Mrs Stamp for her work as Chair of the
committee and noted that her commitment over the last six years has enabled
several large projects to move forward.
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Action
Mrs Stephenson to arrange a handover meeting between Mrs Stamp and Ms
Judith Judd, the incoming Chair, before the next Council meeting on 18 July
2011.
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Ms Bush to write a formal letter of thanks to Mrs Stamp.
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DATE OF NEXT MEETING
Noted
15 November 2011
Karen Bush
Policy and Projects Officer, Human Resources
August 2011
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