England and Wales where the provision was invoked at an employment tribunal hearing.
Furthermore, in the House of Lords, Baroness Thornton highlighted that it is impossible to measure how effective the third-party harassment protection had been because it had only been in place for two years. She argued that the proposals were not " in the interests of society ".
Removal of the right to obtain information in discrimination cases Changes
Currently, people who believe they have been discrimination against in the workplace have the right to obtain information from their employer in order to see whether or not they have a case. This right will be removed through the ERRA.
Criticism
This proposal should be seen in the context of the government ' s overall aim- to reduce the number of employment tribunals that take place. When employees feel they have been discriminated against, they may check whether they are correct by obtaining information from their employer. Without this right, it seems the government hopes fewer cases will go to court.
If this is truly the government ' s motivation, and the Coalition has predicted the outcome correctly, there is an obvious human cost that reflects a profit-over-people ideological drive the Institute of Employment Rights has spotted throughout the present government ' s policies and mapped in our Coalition timeline.
However, there are suggestions that removing the right to obtain information in discrimination cases will actually increase the number of claims going to the tribunal service.
At the IER ' s Equality and Discrimination 2012 event in Liverpool, Felicia Epstein of Pattinson & Brewer Solicitors expressed her concern about this policy, as the information obtained by the employer is a principle method by which workers find out if they have a case at all. This might actually lead to more weak cases making it to court.
Her view was repeated in the House of Lords by Baroness Thornton, who stated that many workers may in fact feel forced to begin proceedings despite a lack of evidence received through obtaining information from the employer. She argued that the Coalition ' s method of trying to stop these workers from making a claim was to charge them a prohibitive amount for taking a claim to court- at £ 250 just to issue a claim and £ 950 for a hearing.
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