Impact of Equality Act 2010 on NHS and St. Andrews Hospital

This report examines the Equality Act 2010 and its implications within the healthcare sector, specifically focusing on the National Health Service (NHS) and St. Andrews Hospital. It investigates how these organizations implement the Act, ensuring equal opportunities and non-discrimination in recruitment and employment practices. The report explores the influence of individual beliefs and behaviors on service users, highlighting both positive outcomes (e.g., increased worker motivation and patient satisfaction) and potential adverse effects (e.g., dissatisfaction among employees). Furthermore, it analyzes the role of media in raising awareness and shaping attitudes toward health and social care issues. The analysis considers factors such as gender reassignment and its impact on service delivery. The report provides a detailed overview of the Equality Act 2010's formulation, its influence on social policy development, and the various factors influencing its implementation. It emphasizes the importance of equal opportunities in healthcare and the challenges faced by firms when implementing the Act, particularly regarding perceptions of fairness and potential conflicts among employees. The report concludes by highlighting the role of mass media in informing the public about healthcare issues.

SOCIAL POLICY AND
CONTEMPORARY ISSUES

TABLE OF CONTENTS
TASK 2............................................................................................................................................1
PORTFOLIO SECTION 3...............................................................................................................1
i. Use of two various companies and explaining impact of media on implementation of the
Act..........................................................................................................................................1
ii. How might beliefs of individuals affect in positive and adverse direction on the services
users........................................................................................................................................1
iii. How might individual behaviour impact positively and negatively on service users when it
comes to implementing this Act?...........................................................................................2
PORTFOLIO SECTION 4...............................................................................................................3
Introduction............................................................................................................................3
Sources of information ..........................................................................................................3
Interpretation of Results ........................................................................................................4
Conclusion .............................................................................................................................6
Bibliography...........................................................................................................................6
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................7
PORTFOLIO SECTION 5...............................................................................................................7
i. Evaluating attitudes and behaviour of public......................................................................7
ii. Possible or actual outcomes/consequences........................................................................8
Justification of answers..........................................................................................................9

TASK 2
PORTFOLIO SECTION 3
i. Use of two various companies and explaining impact of media on implementation of the Act
NHS is following the Equality Act, 2010 in a way that while recruiting people for the firm, all
are given with equal chances to get selected whether they are males or females (Bonoli and
Natali, 2012). At the time of taking interviews, questions asked from the people are same as
well as after selection, working environment provided to the employees are also same. In
addition to this, working hours for all staff members, that is, whether they are males or
females, are same along with their paid salaries.
On the other hand, St. Andrew’s hospital is also complying with the Equality Act, 2010 as they
are offering some extra facilities that is for both; men and women working in the firm like
bonus, rewards, fringe benefits, etc. (Fairweather and Tornatzky, 2013). Apart from that, they
are not discriminating the women even if they are married as allowing them for having
maternity leaves. It is putting a positive impact on the employees as they can be retained in the
long run and company can enjoy benefits from their talent, skills and knowledge in terms of
getting desired results.
ii. How might beliefs of individuals affect in positive and adverse direction on the services users
Beliefs of an individuals create impact on the services users in positive direction at the time of
following Equality Act in proper way. It can be understood like when health and social care
settings like NHS follow all principles of Equality Act, 2010 such as gender reassignment,
workers of the firm get motivated and satisfied and thus, they perform their tasks effectually. It
ultimately results in increasing the satisfaction level of patients, that is, the service users as
motivated workers provide them effective treatment. Therefore, overall, it can be said that
service users get positively impacted by the implementation of Equality Act, 2010.
Apart from that, mass and social media are the ways like Facebook, Twitter, etc. which lead to
create impact on the local community. Moreover, the people able to more aware about the
issues of HSC along with its impact on the health. With the help of mass media, behavior and
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attitude of individuals can be changed as well as upgraded in a positive manner. People in
health and social care industry of UK have become highly aware with the health and social
care services through tools of social media like advertising by which attitude and behavior of
society is getting influenced positively (Shove, 2010).
Different ways are there in which presented information relating to health and social care
issues can influence attitudes, thoughts and behaviour of people that can be understood with
the help taking characteristic of gender reassignment of Equality Act, 2010 into consideration
(Ghimire and Pimbert, 2013). At the time when this act is implemented in health and social
care settings like NHS, as per the characteristic of gender reassignment, it may be possible that
male workers would be against the same. It is because; it is a common perception of make
workers that they put their input and efforts more than females and thus, should be given with
higher payment than that of female workers. Along with that, as per the act, many benefits are
given to the female workers in HSC settings by which male staff feels that partiality is being
done with them and unnecessary, benefits are given to the female workers. Therefore, their dis-
satisfaction leads to render ineffective services to the clients/patients/service users which
makes them unhappy with the same. Thus, it can be said that along with positive impacts, there
are some negative effects as well that the act put on service users when it comes to be
implemented in the firms.
iii. How might individual behaviour impact positively and negatively on service users when it
comes to implementing this Act?
There is a huge relevance of the findings to health and social care locally as in UK, there is a
strong health and social care sector which is significantly changing with the passing time. As
changes are taking place at the global level, locally perspectives of the HSC are getting
changed. In the recent years, there has been seen positive changes in health and social care
sector of UK as well as in the whole world. People at the local level have become highly aware
with the services offered by firms and social policies imposed by government (Brah and
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Phoenix, 2013).
At the time of implementing Equality Act, 2010, both the firms, that is, NHS and St. Andrews
hospital had to face some issues like when they gave equal rights and opportunities to the
female workers, male employees raised issue that they work more than that of females and
thus, women workers should not be given with equal rights (Kemshall, 2010). Apart from that,
taking in consideration the fact that women require some flexible policies for them due to
having lots of responsibilities like taking care of babies, some policies in favour of them have
been imposed by the organisations which created issues for men workers as they felt that firms
are doing partiality with them (Hearn, 2010). Therefore, it was important for both the
hospitality firms to make male workers understand the reason for which new norms and
policies have been imposed so that they would not have any issue and can perform their work
with satisfaction.
PORTFOLIO SECTION 4
Introduction
Equality act, 2010 is all about giving equal opportunities to the people working in a firm or
living in a society as no discrimination can be made with them on the basis of disability, age,
gender reassignment, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or
belief, sex as well as sexual orientation. It is related to health and social care as all dimensions
come under the same have their direct impact on the health of individuals whether physically
or mentally at local and national level (Marx, 2016).
Sources of information
In order to gather the information, different sources have been used like books, journals, online
material, published articles, etc. From these sources, plenty of data has been collected and by
assessing the same, suitable information is used in this section on the basis of which issue has
been resolved. These sources have been considered to be reliable as published data based on
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subject has been collected from authentic sources, that is, after the year 2010 which shows that
the information is fresh and valid.
On the basis of HSC perspective, one of the characteristics, that is, gender reassignment is
taken into consideration that can be explained with taking a current issue. For example: Lami
is a gay who loves to work with young people. He has worked as a mentor since 10 years
where no one knew that is a gay. The manager of firm is strictly an anti-gay who used to speak
completely against of gay people. Lami wants to get married to someone but afraid of the
future results that may lead to the loss of his job. In this case, it is important for the firm to
treat Lami in an equal manner as that of other employees as per the Equality Act 2010 so that
he can freely live his life in a way he wants (Ehrenreich, 2014). As the act states that no firm is
allowed to discriminate employees on the basis of gender reassignment, manager of
organisation is obliged to treat him like other employees.
Interpretation of Results
An Act of Parliament is the reason behind creating a new law or in making some alterations in
the existing law. The Equality Act 2010 came in the process involved in development of a key
act of parliament as in UK, many contemporary issues have raised in which people were facing
discrimination on the various basis like gender, race, religion, age, etc. In order to resolve the
issues of society, the Equality Act 2010 has been formulated so that every firm in health and
social care (HSC) industry like NHS will be liable to follow the same. In its formulation, there
was the input of information, ideas and research done by many different interest groups, people
and firms. Then the information about policy was disseminated and policy was put into action.
The legal act of Quality comes into existence in order to protect those people who face issues
of discrimination at the workplace. Under this, different base of discrimination are such as age,
marital status, gender, disability, maternity, religion, living standard, economic conditions, race
etc. This act came into existence because in UK, employees at the workplace were getting
discriminated by their employers based on stated characteristics. So, to stop this
discrimination, government of UK has imposed this act that every firm whether in health and
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social care industry or of any other sector has to follow (Marx, 2016).
Several factors are there that have influenced the development of social policy like biological,
nutrition and environmental along with including standard of living of people. In UK, main
factors that are leading to development of policies like Equality Act 2010 are discrimination
with people in organisations or in society based on their gender reassignment, religion,
maternity or marriage civil partnership, disability, age, gender, race and sexual orientation (10
key policy issues facing healthcare, 2014). However, one of the main causes is that in health
and social care firms like NHS, staff members feel discriminated based on their gender and
thus, it is important to execute the social policy, that is, the Equality Act 2010. In hospitality
firms, it is a perception that male workers can perform in a better way than that of females and
thus, maximum recruited people in these firms are males. Therefore, by imposing the Equality
Act, 2010, government has made a great effort to reduce these kinds of practices and give
equal opportunities to the females as well.
In today’s era, it is mass media which is making clients of HSC firms aware with the
information related to health and social care issues. Through mass media, gap between NHS
and the clients is getting reduced and people at a large scale are getting information within a
very short duration and in bulk. Along with that, there are some other ways also present by
which information relating to health and social care can reach to public domain like internet,
radio, TV and newspaper. Apart from mass media, social media also plays a vital role in
disseminating information about HSC which includes Facebook, Twitter and others (DuBois
and Miley, 2013).
Various techniques are there by which information relating to health and social care can be
disseminated by NHS among the clients. It is done by sectorial policy which is implemented
by the UK government which includes dispersing information to patients and related parties
through some of the common methods like radio, pamphlets, campaigns based on education as
well as television. Apart from that, there are two other mechanisms also present by which
information related to HSC can be disseminated by NHS among clients, that is, report cards
and accreditation (Wellington, 2015).
One of the most common examples as per the chosen characteristics of Equality Act, 2010 is
gender discrimination that can be understood in a way like at the time of recruitment, some
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firms prefer to select a male candidate rather than an equally qualified female candidate as it is
the perception of employer that a married woman probably will have a child in the near future
due to which she cannot work. Therefore, to reduce these kinds of practices, Equality Act,
2010 came into existence.
Conclusion
It can be articulated from the above report that there are many contemporary issues that are
being faced by the society in terms of health and social care. One of the most common
example that has been assessed from the report is health inequalities existing in the UK. It can
be concluded that media plays the most significant role in making public aware with the issues
and efforts that government is/or is not making towards dealing with them. It is important that
the data gained by public must be reliable and valid so that fruitful results can be gained.
Bibliography
6

REFERENCES
PORTFOLIO SECTION 5
i. Evaluating attitudes and behaviour of public
There is a recent development in health and social care policy as in the present scenario,
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political leaders in UK are making efforts for protecting the nation from economic privations
and recession. For the same, acts like social policies have been amended like The Health and
Social Care Act 2008 and The Health Act 2009. Many amendments have been made in the
same like setting up Valuation Tribunal for England and encouraging Public Participation in
Health.
In the UK, local attitudes reflect those found at national level in a way that within nation,
people are having many dissimilarities in terms of their attitude and country has different local
areas. It is the local attitude which ultimately formulates an aggregate (national) attitude. By
taking into consideration the local attitudes towards different issues and perspectives of HSC,
attitude of people at national level can be understood.
It is important for public residing in the UK to evaluate reliability and validity of information
related to health and social care in NHS before accepting it as a fact. People can do it by
assessing the source from where they have gained the information, person who is issuing the
same and the way it is presented. Here, sources may be like government, political and religious
agendas as well as the pressure groups. It is the responsibility of public to assess that whether
there is any agenda behind publishing the information or it is merely a presentation of facts.
ii. Possible or actual outcomes/consequences
Focusing on the period up to 1945, in 19th century, religion was the main consideration that can
be taken as the voluntary sector in welfare. However, in early 20th century, liberalisation and
British welfare came into existence where votes for women were gained. It can be understood
with taking example of NHS which is following Equality Act 2010 so that social welfare can
be implemented in the organisation. As per this act, no firm is allowed to discriminate people
on the basis of gender, race, sexual orientation, gender reassignment, disability, age, religion,
maternity or marriage civil partnership (Marx, 2016). For example, Marie is working as a
Nurse in NHS where earlier she was not getting paid as that of her male co-workers getting for
the same work. However, after the execution of social policy, that is, Equality Act 2010, she is
being paid in the similar way as her male co-workers are getting. Therefore, on the basis of
gender, firm has now stopped discriminating the staff members.
Changes in ideological approach since 1945 have put a huge impact on contemporary social
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policies as there has been transformation in the function of religion that has compacted with
selection division in welfare. Pauperism had the prime cause of illness and thus, Pitiable Law
Systems have developed the concept “sickbays” for the people who are ill. Social welfare
policy have compacted with the same. Government has imposed provisions like Family income
complement, insurance and pension along with various health and social care schemes like The
Equality Act 2010 which every firm and society has to follow (DuBois and Miley, 2013).
In early 20th century, in the UK, health and social care policy was considered as a distinct area
which later resulted in a cultured society by offering different benefits to citizens in terms of
their health, employability, retirement funds, etc. In USA and Japan, private and professional
insurance proposals have prescribed the health and social care as well as in the Western
Europe, fitness proposal concern was given by state and private bodies. On the other hand, in
Wales, there main focal point is given on patient which leads to an improved society in terms
of their healthcare. Apart from that, in Scotland, government and individual civilians deal with
each other (Wellington, 2015). However, the English policy is straightforward and clear in
which major progress takes place on health of society.
Justification of answers
From the findings it can be said that, nations are required to follow the equality act, 2010 as
per all provisions made with following all its specified characteristics so that it can safeguard
the interest of individuals and would make service providers as well as users satisfied. Besides
this, it can be concluded that health and social care settings in England are following this act
appropriately and keeping their workers as well as clients highly satisfied.
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