Extending Equality Act unworkable - Minister

The Minister of State for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, today said a proposal to extend the Employment Equality Act to outlaw discrimination on grounds of criminal conviction would be unworkable.

Mr Willie O'Dea said legislating against this kind of discrimination would cause great difficulties in practice.

The Equality Authority is seeking to have the Act extended on four new grounds: membership of a trade union, socio-economic status, political opinion and criminal conviction.

The authority says it has received a number of complaints from people claiming to have suffered discrimination because of a criminal conviction.

But the Minister gave the example of supermarkets not being able to discriminate against people who are continually convicted for shoplifting or employers involved with young people not being able to discriminate against convicted paedophiles.

Mr O'Dea such legislation would have "grave consequences" and that he was unhappy with the notion in its present form.

But the chief executive of the Equality Authority, Mr Niall Crowley, said where an offence was "objectively incompatible" with the job an exception would have to be made.

Mr Niall Crowley said the Minister raised a number of challenges but ones that needed to be overcome legislatively. He said it was important to recognise this form of discrimination in order to assist people with criminal convictions back into the workplace.