Blick_UK Politics (9780198825555)_CH10

10.2 How it works 227

Disabled rights Year Legislation

Outcome

1970 Chronically Sick and Disabled Persons Act 1970

Created the scheme of special parking rules for the disabled.

1995 Disability Discrimination Act 1995 Made it illegal to discriminate against disabled people and introduced requirements to provide for disabled access. LGBT Year Legislation Outcome 1967 Sexual Offences Act 1967

Decriminalized sex in private between men aged 21 and over, applied in England and Wales, with similar changes taking place later in Scotland (1980) and Northern Ireland (1982). The controversial Section 28 in this legislation forbade schools from presenting ‘homosexuality … as a pretended family relationship’. It also prohibited the ‘promotion of homosexuality’ by councils. Following a long campaign, the repeal of the Act occurred in 2003. Lowered the age of consent for men having sex with men to 18—still two years higher than for different-sex partners.

1988 Local Government Act 1988

1994 Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 1999 Sex Discrimination (Gender

Protected trans women and men from employment discrimination.

Reassignment) Regulations 1999

Did you find any of the timescales here surprising? Why do you think there has been more legislation in some areas than others? © Oxford University Press 2000 Sexual Offences (Amendment) Act 2000 Lowered the age of consent for men having sex with men to 16, the same as for different-sex partners. 2002 Adoption and Children Act 2002 Made it possible for same-sex couples (and unmarried different-sex couples) to adopt children. 2004 Civil Partnership Act 2004 Made it possible for same-sex couples to enter arrangements similar to marriage. 2004 Gender Recognition Act 2004 Provided for trans women and men to obtain official recognition for their gender, including a replacement birth certificate. 2013 Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013 Provided for couples of the same sex in England and Wales to marry. A change to the same effect was passed in Scotland in 2014, and in Northern Ireland in 2020. Sources: Kelly, 2019; Mortimore and Blick, 2018

iting discrimination from taking place on a basis of these characteristics. The Act also created a requirement for public authorities, when planning policy, to ‘have due re- gard’ to the ‘desirability of’ carrying out their functions ‘in a way that is designed to reduce the inequalities of out- come which result from socio-economic disadvantage’. However, this last stipulation was never brought into force because the Labour government that introduced the 2010 Act lost power that year. The Conservative- Liberal Democrat coalition government that succeed- ed the Labour government in 2010 chose not to imple- ment this particular provision. This part of the Act not

being brought into force is significant, because it means that socio-economic equality is not afforded the same de- gree of legal recognition as other forms of equality (see section 10.3.2 in this chapter for further discussion on this). The Equality Act 2010 does not apply in Northern Ireland, which has its own regime for the promotion of equality, including various legislative measures and the Equality Commission for Northern Ireland, established un- der the Northern Ireland Act 1998 (see Chapter 12). Alongside the legal framework, bodies exist to ensure that it is put into practice. In Wales, Scotland, and England the Equality and Human Rights Commission holds a key