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Equality Works London

Shepherdess Walk Buildings
2 Underwood Row
London N1 7LQ
Tel: 0207 251 4939

Equality Works Manchester

10th Floor, Bridgewater House
Whitworth Street
Manchester M1 6LT
Tel: 0161 200 8540

Carola Towle, National Officer at UNISON

 

An interview with Carola Towle
National Officer for Lesbian, Gay,
Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT)
Equality at UNISON,
 
Carola Towle is National Officer for LGBT Equality at UNISON, the UK’s second largest Trade Union whose members are mainly from the public sector.
 
Equality Works (EW) have worked with Carola for the past two years, providing training and consultancy support in areas such as equalities; disability awareness; recruitment and selection; equality impact assessment (EqIA); and so on. 
 
In this recent interview, Carola outlines some of the benefits that UNISON and its LGBT members have had from the services provided by EW, especially with regard to Equality Impact Assessments (EqIAs).
 
 
What is the approach of UNISON to Equalities?
 
“Equality is one of the founding principles at UNISON, a merged Trade Union established 14 years ago. It’s nothing less than the core of our business!
 
“UNISON is a campaigning union that operates mainly in the public sector. We’re always pushing for change and better legislation for things like public sector equality duties. We’re not a public body, however, so we don’t necessarily need to comply with these duties.
 
“We have nevertheless developed an equality scheme, not because we think we are failing in this area, but because we believe it’s important.”
 
 
How do Equality Impact Assessments fit in
with your approach to Equalities?
 
“We recognise that EqIAs are an integral part of our equality scheme. Running a full and robust EqIA does of course involve lots of work, so we use a checklist to help us decide whether a full impact assessment should be undertaken.”
 
 
How did you develop your EqIA Toolkit
– and what are its key features?
 
“We started by looking at best practice throughout the public sector and identifying those aspects we could use directly.  
 
“What makes UNISON’s approach to equalities so different is the fact that it’s our core business. This is in contrast to an organisation like the NHS, for instance, where healthcare is their core business.
 
“This meant we couldn’t simply adopt the entire Toolkit of another body. In fact, with quite a few important elements, we had to start from scratch.
 
“Our main challenge was to structure the EqIA so that equalities were actively promoted – and that the challenge was seen as being a positive one.”
 
 
What changes or improvements have you made to your service delivery as a result of the EqIA process?
 
“The Equality Scheme Process (of which EqIA is a part) has been created as a three-year action plan where specific targets are clearly identified.”
 
 
How has this benefited UNISON?
 
“Most people here would agree that the benefits have been substantial. It’s enabled us to put vigour into the process. We’ve increased consistency across the board – and to a very high standard. We’ve also identified areas where information was available and a delivery process was in place – but where we hadn’t communicated this clearly enough.”
 
 
Have you been able to quantify the benefits
of your Equalities work for UNISON?
 
“We are currently in the first year of a three-year Equality Plan. An analysis of results will begin later in the year.”