Welcome to your ultimate New Age resource


Age Discrimination Law to Come Into Force

The new anti-age discrimination law whichapplicants to fill out a separate form
will come into force in October will helpoutlining their race and age, this form will
staff retention and improve labour marketbe kept on file but not given to the person
choice according to some employers. However,in the organisation making the decision on
the small employers are a lot less keen onwho  to  employ."
the changes, as they worry about rising
recruitment costs. The new legislationIf that for companies like Asda the coming
requires employers to review all theirinto force of the new law means doing
employment practices to ensure they are basedbusiness as usual as they have a history of
on  skills  and  competencies,  not  age.employing older workers, there are other
companies that are worried about this moment.
The new law will also have an impact on theThis is the case of the firms that market
job adverts. Words and phrases that used tothemselves to a young or old audience and
be the key words in the old adverts may bewant to employ people who reflect their
considered ageist so the employers shouldcustomer  base.
worry  about  this  too.
But there are solutions for these cases
When taking a decision no matter if onoffered by the new law itself. There is a
recruitment, retention or training, theget-out clause for some industries and
employers must leave the age out of it.employers can still discriminate if they can
Beside the advert text, the application formsshow that being a certain age is a genuine
must be carefully reviewed by the companiesoccupational requirement. It is considered a
so they can avoid opening to legal actiongenuine occupational requirement that a
under  new  laws.firefighter shouldn't be older than 55 years
old as he or she has to be physically fit
There are companies that are already applyingenough to pull people from burning buildings
the new requirements and took out the agebut it won't be acceptable for media firms to
from their recruitment application forms.use the genuine occupational requirement
This is the case of Asda. Supermarket Asdaclause to refuse employment or fail to
removed the requirement for job applicants topromote  people  over  the  age  of  50.
tell them their age. Asda's move goes beyond
the terms of the new age rules but it couldThe language of the job adverts should
well  be  a  sign  of  things  to  come.exclude specifying the age but other words
which are associated with age such as
The idea of the new law is not to forbidenergetic may also be problematic. Ms.
employers to know the age of the applicantsMargaret Thirlway, head of employment law at
but to avoid taking the age in considerationLondon-based SA Law, explains that the
in the decision process about hiring thatmeaning of the law is that "The use of an
person.age-loaded word like energetic may not itself
lead to a tribunal, but when combined with a
Stephen Morrall, a partner at law firmpattern of action, such as denying older
Middleton Potts offers the solution:workers training, then it might lead to a
"personnel departments will ask jobclaim".



1 A 19 20 21 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 41 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76