– although their militant trade union leadership is doing them no favours by demanding pay increases which are patently unaffordable.

: the fact that the idea of dedicated, hardworking public servants is something of a myth in many quarters.

That might be unduly harsh if it wasn’t for the fact that so many are perfectly willing to risk derailing Christmas for millions of others.

Taxpayers also have a right to expect services for which they pay to be delivered at least to a minimum agreed standard.

Mandatory minimum-service levels in transport services already exist in other countries

21. IKEA.com had approximately 2.8 billion visits in 2019. (Statista) Comparing the figures to the available data from 2010, these numbers grew fourfold. A decade ago, the website had around 700 million yearly visitors.

73% of workplaces now say they have a formal written policy, compared with 64% in 1998.

The most commonly covered grounds are those where legislation is long standing—sex, race (both covered by 88%, about the same as in 1998) and disability (85%).

religion (82%), sexual orientation (71%) and age (69%).

Discrimination is a moral issue, a question of social justice and human rights. But governmental concern is not only for justice and fairness but also competitiveness and economic efficiency.

Fairness at work’ has been promoted by the post-1997 New Labour government, but it shares with its Conservative predecessors a concern not to ‘overburden’ employers.

There is a concern with fairness — but only up to a point

they have intensified in the context of the post-2008 economic crisis around concerns that the emphasis in the diversity approach on the ‘business case’ allows equality to be downgraded or ignored entirely as work organizations focus on the bottom line or are caught up in restructuring

e Equality Act 2010

the 2010 Act represents a shift towards the fifth generation of equality legislation in Britain, with the adoption of a gender equality duty in the public sector marking the beginning of a more transformative approach, and based on a more comprehensive awareness of the multiple aspects of workplace discrimination

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