Northern Ireland's Equality Commission has settled fair employment cases worth more than £250,000 sterling in the first six months of its existence, it was learnt yesterday.
The 16 cases, eight brought by Protestants, seven by Catholics and one other, all involved allegations of unlawful discrimination on grounds of religious and/or political opinions and led to settlement payments of £254,966 sterling.
Six complainants alleged harassment, three had left or lost their employment and seven cases arose from recruitment drives.
Some of the employers found against were the North's two universities, Queen's and the University of Ulster, the Northern Ireland Tourist Board, the RUC, the Royal Irish Regiment and Securicor Guarding.
All the cases occurred between October 1st, 1999, when the commission assumed its responsibilities, and March 31st of this year.
The commission's chief executive, Ms Evelyn Collins, said there often was a stark discrepancy between employers' policies on fair employment and their practices on the ground as well as an ignorance of the Fair Employment Code of Practice.
"Equality policies not only have to be in place, they have to be widely known, understood and supported. Above all, they must be consistently implemented by staff at all levels," she added.
Ms Collins pointed to the financial cost to businesses and public bodies of settlements as well as to the disruption and deterioration of working relationships when such cases occurred. Her greatest concern, however, was for the complainants for whom discriminatory behaviour at work was a "distressing and isolating" experience.
Sinn Fein yesterday said the size of the settlements was evidence of the scale of the problem and called on institutions such as the RUC and the universities to produce "timescaled and targeted" equality plans.
The SDLP called for a review of equality legislation to make it easier to bring cases of discriminatory land sales against auctioneers and estate agents who favoured buyers of one religious or political persuasion.
While there were provisions for these cases in the legislation, it was extremely difficult for people to gather evidence of such discrimination, the party said.