Lesson video

Hi, I'm Mr. Amott, and welcome to lesson four out of six in the scheme of work called Are People Treated Equally in UK Society? Today's lesson is called, "Why Do We Need Laws on Equality in the UK?" All you need for today's lesson is a pen, paper and somewhere quiet to work.

There's also a worksheet attached to today's lesson which has some of the videos that you'll need to complete the activities.

So it might be a good idea to find that now before we start.

So I'll just give you a second or two just to get all of that sorted out.

Fantastic, so hopefully you're all ready to start today's lesson so we'll begin.

So the first thing I'm going to do is talk to you about what we're going to cover in today's lesson.

So the first thing we're going to do is we're going to do a little bit of a recap about what is equality? Okay.

We're also going to talk about how laws on equality have changed over time.

During the lesson, 'cause we're going to look at lots and lots of different laws today, it might be an idea to think about, as we're going through the lesson, what problem were these laws trying to address? Okay.

We're also going to look at two personal accounts about how the law has impacted on people, and those two personal accounts are going to talk about racial discrimination.

We're then going to bring it back and we're going to have a brief look back about why it was the Equality Act in 2010 was introduced? So let's get into your recap hat.

So school canteen has decided to treat everyone the same today and only serve one choice of lunch, roast chicken.

Why might this be a problem for some people and what should the canteen do? So what I'd like you to do is pause the video and have a think about those two questions.

Great, so hopefully you've had a good go at doing that.

So why might it be a problem for some people? It might be a problem, some people have to go without lunch 'cause they might be a vegetarian, they might be vegan.

They might follow a religion that does not permit them to eat meat, or they might have an allergy to chicken.

Okay, what should the canteen do? Could they offer alternative options to increase choice? Consult the school community and religious groups to make sure that the food they're offering is suitable for everybody? And could they do some training for their staff about diversity and equality? I think this task is a really, really interesting task 'cause it brings out a really key issue, okay.

Treating everybody the same isn't always equality, because sometimes people might need to be treated slightly differently.

Now what I'd like you to do is maybe try and think of some examples about this.

So when might people need to be treated differently when they're at work, maybe during their daily lives? Why might people need a bit of extra, bit of different treatment? You might want to think about somebody's age, their sex, even their religion.

Why might they need to be treated differently? Okay.

So once you've done that, we're going to go onto the next task.

So what I want you to do is, nice easy one, what option is it? What year was the Equality Act introduced? Excellent, hopefully 'cause we did it right at the start of the lesson, the Equality Act was introduced in 2010.

In what year did the Representation of the People Act allow women to vote? Okay, so there's option one, two, three or four.

Okay, we might have done it, it was option two, 1918.

So a lot later than some people think.

I know when I teach this in my lessons, students often go for one of the earlier options, and it was actually quite late.

And you might of learnt about that when you've learnt about the Suffragettes in one of the other citizenship units.

Okay, so we're going to talk about why do we have laws? Okay.

And we have laws for several different reasons.

We have them for protection, so we need laws to protect ourselves and each other, to keep us all safe wherever we go.

We need laws to keep the peace.

People in public need to know what they can and cannot do.

We all need to be able to live peacefully together.

And we need to have justice.

So we need to make sure that everybody's treated fairly and that nobody is discriminated against.

And again, that goes back to thinking about equality.

Okay, so equality isn't just about everybody being treated equally.

Sometimes, people might need slightly different treatment to make sure they get their justice.

Okay, so sometimes like, for example, a disabled person might need slightly different treatment to make sure that they're treated fairly.

Okay.

So next thing we're going to do is answer these questions.

So what was the experience of the sisters at school? Which law was mentioned? What did the police begin to do because of changes in the law? And the Race Relations Act 1976 led police to appoint equalities and diversity officers.

What did Janett help the police to do? Okay, and the key terms there is B-A-M-E which is Black Asian Minority Ethnic.

My name is Janett My experience growing up in the '70s onwards really contrasts with my older brothers and sisters.

Some of them had said they'd had quite bad, negative experiences of the education sector; racist teachers, neighbours, stuff like that.

It feels very different to what my personal experience was.

Three of my eldest sisters have gone on to study at night school.

They've really gone out of their way.

It wasn't school that spring-boarded them, it was their own initiative.

By the time my generation came around, for me, it was expected that's what you do and that's how you progress.

But for my sisters, I think one of my sisters was given career advice of going to work in a factory.

Another was encouraged to go and work at the dry cleaners.

There were quite a few jobs that were protected by the Race Relations Act, and in terms of equalities, genuinely having an occupational characteristic of race, gender or language, and these being something that would help and enable you to do your job.

For about two to three years, I was an associate trainer with London Metropolitan service training police officers at all levels and all aspects of the workforce around diversity and equalities.

They used to have their own in-house trainers, but by bringing in so-called community trainers they got a different perspective.

That's a piece of work I'm actually really, really quite proud of because I feel it had an impact.

You know, whether it was one statement or one huge thing that got a police officer to look at themselves again or think about what they were doing when they were stopping and searching, and the impact on those communities.

Things such as the Race Relations Act has really opened the floodgates for people and organisations and institutions to look at themselves and to actually think about who they are and to change and to develop.

Okay, so there are the questions.

So pause the video and answer those questions.

So hopefully you've watched that video.

I found that video really, really interesting, and these are the answers that I got so I'm just going to give you a little bit of feedback.

So what was the experience of the sisters at school? They had negative experiences at school including racist comments and limited advice from careers teachers which did not encourage them to meet their full potential.

What law was mentioned? The law mentioned was the Race Relations Act 1976.

What did the police do because of changes in the law? They invited community trainers to work with police officers on diversity and equality issues.

And that leads into the last question.

So the Race Relations Act 1976 led police to appoint equality and diversity officers.

What did Janett help the police to do? Janett became an associate trainer with the police, training officers and helping them develop their approaches to inclusion, diversity and equality.

Super.

So just to go over two really key terms then relating to that video.

Race.

Race refers to the protected characteristic of race.

It refers to a group of people defined by their race, colour and nationality, including their citizenship, so what country they belong to, their ethnic or national origins.

Racism is treating somebody unfairly because of their race, colour, nationality, or ethnic or national origins.

And I want you to answer the below questions.

So when did Shango arrive in the UK? What kind of discrimination did Shango experience when he came to the UK? What does Shango think about racism in society and the impact of race relations law on people's attitudes and actions? I came here on a ship called the Ascania in 1962 from Trinidad and Tobago.

And for the first time in my life, I was adrift on a sea of circumstance, having to take care of my own self.

And that was a rough time for me.

I had to face certain realities and some of those were in housing.

You know, the ads in the shop windows still said, "No Irish, No Blacks, No Dogs." I think laws that outlawed discrimination in public places were very important and they came about because of the challenges that we face as immigrants and the response that we had.

You come to a place where you're looking for a house or a room to rent that has been advertised and the person says, "Why not try that other place around the corner? My other tenants might object." "Very sorry, it's just gone" or something like that.

When you hear that three or four times or five times you begin to think, "No, it's not just gone.

You don't want me to stay on those premises but you are afraid to say that." So there were all these excuses that allowed racism, covert racism to go unchallenged.

Once that legislation was in place, people found it a lot harder to do what they had been doing before.

I think it still went on to some degree because laws don't change the minds of the people, not immediately anyway.

But when there is legislation in place, people think twice and they begin to think, "Am I wrong? Am I doing wrong? Are these people really, are their rights being violated? Can I do something different? I have to think differently otherwise I'll fall foul of the law." So I think that legislation changed things positively for the better.

So there are the questions again.

So just pause this video and then we'll recap the answers in a moment.

I hope you enjoyed that video.

I found that video really, really interesting.

I think his experiences were quite shocking.

But at the same time, I think it was really interesting what he had to say.

So what year did Shango arrive in the UK? He arrived in 1962.

What kind of discrimination did Shango experience when he first came to the UK? It was racism, okay.

So we've just looked at today's definitions, it was clearly racism.

So what happened to him? He was repeatedly refused rooms that were available for rent and told the other tenants might object to him renting a room.

And again, if you look at what year he came, it wasn't that long ago, and that's quite shocking when you think that kind of thing was happening.

So what does Shango think about racism in society and the impact of race relations law on people's attitudes and actions? Shango feels that the introduction of laws to address racial discrimination has had a positive impact.

The laws make people question their attitudes and behaviour toward black and minority groups.

So moving on.

I'm not going to read this all out for you, but I'll read it out when I go through the answers with you.

So what I'd like you to do is I want you to pause the video, I want you to read through this information, and I want you to add in those missing words at the bottom.

The missing words are legislation, tightened, discrimination, illegal and ethnic.

And when I go through the answers with you in a moment, I'll read all of the text out for you.

Okay, so just pause the video and fill in the missing words.

Excellent, so welcome back.

Hopefully you've all had a good go at that task.

So I'll go through the answers now with you.

So the Race Relations Act 1965 was the first piece of legislation, that's a posh word for laws really, in the UK to forbid racial discrimination.

The act banned racial discrimination in public places and made the promotion of hatred on the grounds of colour, race or ethic or national origins an offence.

Discrimination, so that's the next missing word, is when a person is treated unfairly because of who they are or the characteristics they have.

For example, because of their religion, their race, their sexuality, or whether they are a boy or a girl.

In 1968, a new Relations Act law made it illegal for someone to be refused housing, a job or access to services, like a mortgage, because of their, and again the next missing word, ethnic background.

Then in 1976, the third Race Relations Act tightened law even more.

It outlined what direct and indirect discrimination was, and the Commission for Racial Equality was founded.

All of laws made it illegal, that's the last missing word, to discriminate against somebody because of the colour of their skin, which is racial discrimination.

So hopefully, you had a good go at that.

If you made any mistakes, just pause the video and just make sure that you've got the right words filled in in your gap-fill activity.

So feeding into the next activity, what I would like you to do is, there are lots of laws that are all about equality, and what I would like you to do is put them in, write them down in the correct order, so in chronological order.

So what came first? So can you pause the video and do that now for me please? Excellent, so the answer, the first law was in 1918 which was the Representation of the People Act.

Then in 1970, we had the Equal Pay Act.

In 1976, we had the Race Relations Act.

In 2003, we'd had Employment Equality, and, brackets, sexual orientation regulations.

Sorry, I don't know why I said brackets, sounded a bit weird there.

Also in 2003, we had Employment Equality, religion or belief regulations.

And in 2006, we had Employment and age regulations.

Okay, so I don't want to tell you what they are now because that links into your next task.

So we've just looked at all of those laws, and what I would like you to do is what problem were those laws trying to solve? So again, look at the problem and try and match that problem up with the act, the piece of law that was trying to fix that problem.

Okay, so just pause the video now.

So hopefully, that task is quite tricky, so hopefully you've had a good go at that.

So I'll go through the answers here with you.

So 1918 Representation of the People Act.

A problem was that men were allowed to vote in elections but women were not, so that act tried to solve that problem.

Okay, the Equal Pay Act.

The problem was that men were paid more money for doing the same job as women.

The Race Relations Act.

The problem was a landlord was putting up signs outside houses that they had for rent saying, "No Blacks, No Irish." Remember, that's similar to Shango's story.

Okay, and we had the 2003 Employment Sexual Orientation Regulations.

So a gay woman is not allowed a promotion because a member of the team refuses to work with her because she is gay.

The 2003 Employment Equality Religion or Belief Regulations, when a company only employ people who say they are Jewish.

And 2003 Employment Equality Age Regulations, and that's when, 'cause the problem was companies were forcing all people over 60 to retire.

So that's quite interesting.

I quite enjoyed doing that task when I was making this lesson and hopefully you enjoyed it too.

So that takes us back to looking at the Equality Act, and you'll remember the Equality Act from lesson one.

So the Equality Act 2010 legally protects people from discrimination in society.

This replaced the previous anti-discrimination laws with a single act, making the law easier to understand and strengthening protection in some situations.

It sets out the different ways in which it's unlawful to treat someone.

And this talks about the protected characteristics again, what we looked at in lesson one.

And you will see the protected characteristics in that picture that's on the side there.

So what is protected? The Equality Act of 2010 makes sure that people with particular characteristics are protected from discrimination.

These are protected characteristics.

Discrimination is treating somebody unfairly because of their characteristics.

Okay, and again, characteristics are just there and you hopefully will remember the protected characteristics from lesson one.

That leads us into our final task of today.

So I want you to think about all of the laws that we've looked at today.

And why has the law on equality changed over time, and what is the benefit of having a single piece of legislation on equality? So I want you to answer those questions.

Try and write a couple of sentences, ideally a paragraph for each one, and then I'll recap back for you in a moment.

So can you pause the video now to complete that task? Wonderful, so hopefully you've had a good go at that and this is how I would have answered this question.

So the law has changed considerably over time as steps have been taken to try and ensure that no one is discriminated against because of their characteristics, and as values and attitudes in society have changed.

Okay, and my answer to the second question would have been, a number of individual pieces of equalities legislation were replaced with the 2010 Equality Act to simplify the law and make it easier to understand and implement.

Okay, remember that last slide, there were loads and loads of laws, so it was quite complicated and the 2010 Act was designed to make it much easier.

Okay, the Act also ensures private, public and voluntary organisations do not discriminate against their employees or people who use their services.

So that brings us to the end of today's lesson.

So in today's session, we have heard two personal accounts from Janett and Shango that clearly show why law equality is needed and why the law needed to change over time.

And the positive effects these changes have had on society on reducing discrimination and improving how people treat each other.

As those case studies showed, there is still work to be done as those involved in the videos clearly stated.

And then we also looked at the Equality Act 2010 and how it brought all of those laws together.

So fantastic work again today.

So, if you would like to, please ask your parent or carer to share your work on Instagram, Facebook or Twitter tagging @OakNational with the hashtag #LearnwithOak.

It would be great to see some of your work.

Before you log out today, please complete the exit quiz just to recap and make sure you've understood some of the key concepts that we looked at in the lesson today.

So thank you all for your hard work and I will see you in lesson five.