Understanding Age Legislation - What does it mean?

On 1 October 2006 The Employment Equality (Age) Regulations brought a host of new guidelines and rules into effect, aimed at preventing any kind of age-related prejudicial actions or behaviour in the workplace.

Whilst the regulations do not affect the age at which people can claim their state pension, they do:

• Ban unjustified retirement ages of below 65.
• Ban age discrimination in terms of recruitment, promotion and training.
• Remove the current age limit for unfair dismissal and redundancy rights.

The regulations also introduced:

• A right for employees to request working beyond retirement age and a duty on employers to consider that request.
• A new requirement for employers to give at least six months' notice to employees about their intended retirement date so that individuals can plan better for retirement, and be confident the 'retirement' is not being used as cover for unfair dismissal.
• The regulations apply to employment and vocational training. They prohibit unjustified direct and indirect age discrimination, and all harassment and victimisation on grounds of age (young or old).

Other changes included:

• The removal of the upper age limit for unfair dismissal and redundancy rights, giving older workers the same rights to claim unfair dismissal.
• The removal of age limits for Statutory Sick Pay, Statutory Maternity Pay, Statutory Adoption Pay and Statutory Paternity Pay. Therefore, all four statutory payments apply in exactly the same way to everyone.
• Providing exemptions for many age based rules in occupational pension schemes.