Is accent discrimination unlawful?
According to new research by the University of Essex, London and Essex accents are deemed to be “less intelligent” than those from other parts of south east England. Can employers use someone's accent to reject their job application?
The study surveyed attitudes towards accents across south east England by playing clips of speakers reading the same script. The listeners were then asked to rate the speakers’ intelligence and people from London and Essex were judged to be less intelligent than those from other south east regions.
Whilst it’s unlawful under the Equality Act 2010 to discriminate against job applicants on the ground of their race, including their nationality or national origins, it’s currently not unlawful to discriminate against them on the ground of their regional accent. For example, Liverpool, Newcastle and Birmingham are English cities that are well known for their strong regional accents, but it wouldn’t amount to unlawful discrimination to reject a job applicant because they had such an accent. The only exception here is that England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are treated as separate nations and so it can constitute race discrimination to treat, for example, a Scottish job applicant less favourably than an English one.
Although the participants in this survey perceived some regional accents to be less intelligent than others, that’s a negative judgement based on entrenched and often unconscious accent prejudice rather than a reality. There is no “correct” or “proper” way of speaking and employers could lose out on a great job applicant if they refuse to offer them a job purely because of their accent. As accent bias can arise at the interview stage of recruitment, it’s better to do panel interviews using a diverse panel rather than one-on-one interviews and to ensure that the questions put to all interviewees are the same.
Related Topics
-
Practical guide: Tax-efficient will planning with residential property
An individual has a significant property portfolio which provides them with their sole source of income. They want to gift shares in some property to their daughter but retain the income. Can they do this without triggering the reservation of benefit rules?
-
Will HMRC treat late processed invoices as errors?
Your business processes invoices when they have been approved by budget holders, so some will be processed a month late, delaying your input tax claim. How might HMRC’s updated guidance help here?
-
Are redundancy payments tax deductible?
A seemingly simple question we’re often asked is how much tax relief a business is entitled to for redundancy payments. The answer is that it depends on the situation. How might the circumstances of a redundancy affect the tax deduction?