Local Democracy, Economic Development and Construction Bill [HL]

My Lords, before I address this group of amendments, I put on record the recognition for the amount of work that the noble Lord, Lord Low, and the noble Baroness, Lady Wilkins, have done over the years in support of fighting—rightly—for the rights of people with a range of disabilities. Just looking through their past record, I can see that it is a tribute to the work they have done that they have achieved so much. Amendments 4, 8 and 26 deal with the issue of accessibility for people with disabilities to information disseminated under the duty to promote democracy. Amendments 4 and 8 seek to ensure that information disseminated to local people by councils in discharging their duty to promote democracy is available in formats accessible to disabled people. Amendment 26 adds an additional clause to the Bill, which would require local authorities to publish an annual report listing any information that they have disseminated under Clause 1 which they did not make available in formats accessible to people with disabilities. I reassure noble Lords that making information accessible to traditionally underrepresented or hard-to-reach groups is a fundamental principle of the duty to promote democracy; I thank the noble Lord, Lord Low, for recognising and supporting that duty. We intend that this will be clearly set out in both statutory and best-practice guidance. I think that the noble Lord, Lord Low, and the noble Baroness, Lady Wilkins, aim to achieve a wider goal than that offered by these amendments, and would like to ensure that local authorities and other public service providers supply all information in a way that is accessible to people with disabilities. I greatly support the wider principle and the spirit behind the amendments. However, I do not believe these amendments, if accepted, would do much to further this aim as they are legally unnecessary. Let me explain. The Bill has been drafted in the light of other legislation. We will expect councils to promote democracy while also complying with other existing legislation. The Disability Discrimination Act requires councils to make reasonable adjustments so that disabled people can access information. Additionally the current disability equality duty requires, among other things, public authorities to have due regard to the need to take steps to take account of people’s disabilities and encourage them in public life when fulfilling their functions. Councils will be expected to operate under the planned equality duty which will replace the DDA and other equality duties. It will broaden and strengthen the current requirement on public authorities and will require public authorities to consider how they can meet different needs. The Office for Disability Issues is working closely with the Government Equalities Office to ensure that protection from disability discrimination is properly reflected in the new equality Bill. In the light of this, it would not be legally or practically desirable to accept these amendments and build into this legislation a requirement that is in effect broadly covered by the Disability Discrimination Act, where it is reasonable for the authority to make such adjustments. In fact, it may undermine the general equalities duties, as well as other legislation that does not have specific disabilities access requirements built in, but which is fully intended to operate in the context of the general equalities duties on public authorities. The equality Bill, which we hope will shortly be joining us in this legislative Session, will be accompanied by statutory codes of practice produced by the Equality and Human Rights Commission, which is keen to stress that information should be accessible to all people. The Equality and Human Rights Commission will be taking forward work to publicise and champion the new duty, which of course will be very high on its as well as the Government’s agenda. Amendment 26 is particularly concerned with monitoring the accessibility for disabled people of information disseminated by local authorities when promoting democracy. This amendment will require local authorities to produce annual reports on the information which has been made public or available under Clause 1, but which was not made available in formats accessible to disabled people. I understand that the noble Lord sees this as a discipline on local authorities, but we feel that the effect would be to impose on local authorities an unnecessary bureaucratic process and therefore an additional burden without necessarily making more information available to people with disabilities in accessible formats. I know that monitoring is of particular interest to the noble Lord, Lord Low, and I would like to outline the various monitoring efforts that the Government are already making in regard to this issue and, I hope, address some of the issues raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Warsi. For example, as part of the comprehensive assessment, the inspectorates of local services will look at how well local priorities express community needs and aspirations. The inspectorate has made clear in its framework document for comprehensive area assessment that understanding the needs and aspirations of communities should always include those whose circumstances make them vulnerable and those who are hardest to reach or hear. Inspectorates have also indicated that they may need to better understand the extent to which local partners are sensitive to the particular communication or other needs of minority or marginalised groups. There is also recourse, through judicial review instigated by an individual or the Equality and Human Rights Commission, against those public authorities that failed to give regard to the disability equality duty. Similarly, if a listed public authority fails to publish a disability equality scheme, or comply with another requirement of specific public sector duties, the commission could issue a compliance notice against them and subsequently enforcement actions would follow were those specific duties not complied with. As I have said, I of course support the spirit of these amendments. As the noble Lord has shown, in terms of the research that he has commissioned, we have clearly seen that some public authorities are still struggling to meet their responsibilities under this existing legislation. However, I believe that the situation is improving in some areas. Recent reports suggest that the disability equality duty is being used to make improvements for disabled people, and stakeholder groups with which the Office for Disability Issues works closely suggest that the duty has been used in a positive way to make changes. In fact, research published in December examining the experience of public authorities in implementing the disability equality duty, found that greater priority was being given to disability equality issues within public sector bodies, and there were examples of mainstreaming disability equality and policy-making. However, clearly there are still challenges to achieve our commitment of equality for people with disabilities by 2025, which is why the Office for Disability Issues will be following up with a toolkit called Producing Better Information for Disabled People, which will be published in April and specifically aimed at local authorities. Although I am unable to accept the noble Lord’s amendments, there are a number of additional actions that I will commit to take forward, which may help to support the principles behind the amendments and will give an extra push to efforts already being made in this area, I hope. First, I intend to write to Trevor Phillips in his capacity as chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, passing on the concerns outlined by noble Lords in relation to accessibility, and asking the commission in its monitoring role to look at ways in which local authorities’ provision of information to people with disabilities can be monitored more closely and in a way that achieves tangible change. Secondly, we will clearly set out reminders about the requirements on local authorities under equality legislation in both the statutory and best-practice guidance accompanying the duty. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Low, for generously accepting my offer made in Committee for him to be involved in the drafting of the guidance. We will of course be involving the Equality and Human Rights Commission, the Office for Disability Issues and the Government Equalities Office in producing the guidance, as we are keen that it covers these points clearly and strongly. Thirdly, I will discuss with colleagues in government the importance of the issues raised by these amendments to see whether there are other avenues available to us in forwarding this agenda. I will write to my right honourable friend Harriet Harman, in her capacity as Minister for Women and Equality, informing her of these debates and asking for her views on the topics raised. Finally, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Low, and the noble Baroness, Lady Wilkins, for tabling the amendments a second time, and allowing us the opportunity to further raise the profile of these important issues. I hope that I have gone some way to reassure them by my reply and that they understand why I must resist the amendments. There is little advantage in merely having provisions in this Bill that are so similar to what is already required under the Disability Discrimination Act, which requires authorities to make reasonable adjustments for disabled people. Instead, we should promote the issues raised by these amendments and ensure that all is done to improve in real terms the way the public authorities discharge their current and future duties. With this, I hope that the noble Lord will agree to withdraw his amendment.