European Union Equality Policies and Workplace Legislation - Essay Example

EUROPEAN UNION EQUALITY POLICIES AND WORKPLACE LEGISLATION al Affiliation) The European Union formulates policies and legislations through their employment law to provide protection for workers’ rights in all states under the European Union. The conditions commonly known as the workplace legislations protect workers from discrimination based on gender, age, religion or beliefs, races, ethnicity, and many others. The European Union policies and the workplace legislations ensure the provision of equal access to employment, fair and equal treatment of workers at the workplace such as during giving of training offers and benefits. The legislation also advocate for the provisions that ensure that the disabled people in the society are able to work comfortably. This essay shall discuss the equality policies and workplace legislations that cover gender, age, religion and belief, race, and ethnicity. Gender The European Union has formulated policies that advocate for gender equality in many angles. They ensure and promote the existence of equity between men and women, the promote application of gender mainstreaming and facilitate exploration of transgender issues. The policies ensure that the European Union observes gender equality in all the activities at the workplace. The legislations through the Treaty of Rome came up with a principle that ensure that each member state shall give equal pay for men women for equal work (Allen QC & Crasnow, 2001). This principle advocates for equality between men and women and concentrates in the equality at the workplace than in the society. Among all the inequalities in the workplace, the European Union takes more focus to address the issue of gender inequality. The European Union has so far launched a committee that advocates for women rights in its member states. It then established a commission on equal opportunities for all gender to support the activities carried out by the advisory that handles issues on the availability of equal opportunities between men and women. To sum all these efforts up the European Union has a Commissioner that issues an annual report on gender equality (Carver & Mottier, 1998). The European union refers to equality between men and women when dealing with issues of gender equality rather than women rights since the latter appears as one sided which shows one kind of gender is given dominance. Apart from the provision of equal pay for equal work of an equal value for all gender the European Union has a directive that ensures equal treatment for all gender in matters concerning access to training and employment. This clause also includes the promotion, hiring and dismissals. There is the existence of an equal treatment gender, which requires the equal treatment of both men and women when it comes to issues of social welfare code. The legislatives and policies have provided for equality between men and women on matters concerning health and safety at workplaces for the sickly, pregnant and the disabled. There is equal working time to all gender under the European Union territory. The working place legislations have a directive on parental leave. This directive ensures that workplaces give equal time to both mothers and fathers to go and spend time with their children at home (Foblets et al., n.d.). The European Court of Justice in all member states enforces the equal treatment requirements in all gender. Equality for all gender in social security is applicable with exceptions of some items such as the retirement ages and the entitlements to survivor’s pensions. The protection of pregnant women from working at night, exposure to harmful conditions and the rights to maternity breaks enhance gender equality at the workplace. These policies and workplace legislation have been effective and in practice in majority of the member states. Recent judgments from the European Court of Justice are a proof of their implementation. The facts and points about gender equality on workplace are clear indications of the effectiveness of the legislations. First, companies cannot dismiss women workers on fixed-term contracts because they were pregnant. Second, women have the opportunity to receive the same retirement benefits as men even though they retire early than men. In some circumstances, women may be given priority in appointments when they are equally or slightly less qualified than their men counter parts, though the priority is not conditional or automatic (Giddings & Drewry, 2004). A critical assessment should always be carried out on the issue and there should be no incidence of women being promoted over men if they are under qualified. Men workers should by no means qualify for an incapacity allowance at a later age than that of the women unless it is an allowance directly linked to that of the pension since it allows for the difference in age. Women have equal chances to work as in the armed services to that of men. Despite this, they should be concentrated more on the electronic and service departments as opposed to the frontline of the war. All these shows gender equality legislations that advocate the equal contribution in the workforce by both men and women. Racism and Ethnic Equality A large population of the people living in the member states of the European Union is of different races and ethnic backgrounds from the locals that dominate those specific states. This group consists of workers and families, which migrated to Europe after its establishment. Some of them constitute of refugees and asylum seekers who came to these territories to seek safety from their unbearable origins. The European Union has policies and workplace legislations that are put in place to ensure the equality of workers in respect to race and ethnicity. The European Union for the equality of workers along racial and ethnicity lines started as a European Parliament, Council and Commission declaration of 1986 for the fight against racism. For many years now the European Union has condemned any actions relating to racism, holocaust denial or xenophobia in its workplaces. This action was to promote the achievement equality at workplaces in all their activities (Hailbronner, 2000). Members from all races and ethnic backgrounds should get equal chances of employment when it comes to selection and recruiting. They should also get equal pay for equal type and amount of job done. Racial discrimination is a vice that discourages economic growth in any kind of organization. It also lowers employee motivation leading little or no growth of the affected employees. Due to this reasons, the European Union find it vital to discourage its practice in the workplace areas. There is presence of well formulated laws in the European Union that ensure equality to all races in the workplaces. These legislations make ensure that the rights of all workers are observed regardless of their races and ethnic origins. The minority ethnic groups are given priority in certain areas of the workplaces to ensure equality. This area includes appointment and promotion. They are at times considered more than their counterparts who dominate the workplaces in a bid to try raise their population in these organizations (Horspool, 2006). These legislations ensure that all races and ethnic origins are given equal chances when it comes to employment benefits such as training, employment allowances and retirement benefits. The workplace legislations are effective and fully practiced in some member states though not a majority. Many member states give priority to their locals when it comes to employment issues. This is done to safeguard the domestic workers from competition by the foreign workers. All workers are allocated equal salaries but in this is not the case in real sense since foreign employees get less employment incomes through double taxation. Religion and Belief The European Union has respect to all religion and beliefs and does not encourage discrimination along these lines in any way. As a result, the European Union have policies and legislations in place that ensure equality to people from all religions and beliefs in workplaces. The discrimination along these lines is not widely experienced in the European Union member states so there are no provisions such as those in the other forms of discrimination. It is near to impossible to find an organization that does not give equal payment to its workers due to religion and belief lines (Rossilli, 2000). The policies and legislation linked to this type of discrimination usually relate to the Sabbath and work practice in the areas of workplace. The legislations ensure that all workers are allowed to attend their respective Sabbaths. It is advocated that the organizations should give their employees offs on their respective Sabbaths. The organizations should also not expose their workers in work practices that are against their religions and beliefs. Despite all these measures to try to promote equality of religion and beliefs in the European Union, effectiveness and implementation does not seem attainable. Most work places do not consider their workers’ religions and beliefs when giving offs due to Sabbath reasons or when exposing them to work practices. The positive fact in this situation is that they are treated the same hence there being no existence of discrimination. Age The European Union advocates for equality for all workers in the workplaces areas. There is formulation of much legislation to ensure this takes place in Europeans Union’s member states. In most cases, the young employees are given priority than the old aged employees. These legislations ensure that the old aged employees are not exposed to hazardous working conditions as well as not given too much strenuous work. This would discourage their active participation in the workplaces and therefore create inequality. Many organization give priority to the youth during appointment and selection. Since the Europe’s population is an aging one, this leaves many old people unemployed. The legislations advocated for provision of equal chances of employment to be given to all ages. Since the young are the majority in the workplaces, priority is given to the old to balance the numbers (Wiesbrock, 2010). Equality for the Disabled people According to the World Health Organization’s estimation, the European Union has more than 30 million people with disabilities. Though a large percentage of this group is outside the workforce, there is great need to provide equality for the people with disability in the workplaces. The European Union has many policies and legislation that protect the rights if these group in the working areas. These legislations ensure that employees provide a small percentage in their employment vacancies, which are only to be taken by the people with disabilities. The organizations should also provide safe and healthy conditions to enhance the comfort of the disabled workers in the workplaces (Yanasmayan, 2014). These legislations ensure the advocating and creation of awareness on people with disabilities. The members of state of the European Union take this matter with the seriousness that it deserves by fully implementing it in their regions. References Allen QC, R. and Crasnow, R. 2001. Employment law and the human rights. London: Blackstone. Carver, T. and Mottier, V. 1998. Politics of sexuality. London: Routledge. Collins, H., Davies, P. and Rideout, R. 2000. Legal regulation of the employment relation. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers Group. Foblets, M., Alidadi, K., Yanasmayan, Z. and Nielsen, J. n.d.. Belief, law and politics. Giddings, P. and Drewry, G. 2004. Britain in the European Union. Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan. Hailbronner, K. 2000. Immigration and asylum law and policy of the European Union. The Hague: Kluwer Law International. Horspool, M. 2006. European Union law. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Rossilli, M. 2000. Gender policies in the European Union. New York: P. Lang. Wiesbrock, A. 2010. Legal migration to the European Union. Leiden: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers. Yanasmayan, Z., Foblets, M., Alidadi, K. and Nielsen, J. 2014. Belief, law and politics. Farnham, Surrey, UK England: Ashgate. Read More