All trustees, volunteers, employees, and members must abide by this equality and diversity policy.
The Friends of Southwark Park Charity is committed to making diversity, equity, and inclusion part of everything we do and to maintain and develop a successful organisation. The Friends of Southwark Park is where people of different views, backgrounds and experiences can come together to preserve, promote, support, assist and improve our parks and open spaces.
Our aim is for The Friends of Southwark Park to be representative of all sections of our community including those who experience socio-economic disadvantage and help deliver better outcomes. Socio-economic duty will be a key approach in supporting the most vulnerable in our society and extremely important as we recover from the pandemic crisis. How our parks are promoted matters and we aim to ensure diversity, equity, and inclusion are put into practice.
The policy’s purpose is to:
- Practice equality, fairness and respect
- Not unlawfully discriminate because of the Equality Act 2010 protected characteristics of age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, race (including colour, nationality, and ethnic or national origin), religion or belief, sex (gender) and sexual orientation
- Not discriminate because discriminate because of socio-economic characteristics including housing tenure (e.g. council tenants)
- Oppose and avoid all forms of unlawful discrimination and discrimination because of socio-economic characteristics
The organisation commits to:
- Create an environment free of bullying, harassment, victimisation and unlawful discrimination, promoting dignity and respect, and where individual differences and contributions are recognised and valued
- Take seriously complaints of bullying, harassment, victimisation and discrimination
- Being an organisation which is inclusive and values difference by attracting, recruiting, developing and retaining people from all sections of the community to contribute at every level of the organisation
- Ensuring that our services are relevant and accessible to all
- Complying with the Equality Act 2010
- Ensuring that all our trustees, volunteers and employees understand their responsibility to promote Equality and Diversity and challenge inappropriate behaviour, and tackle discrimination in all its forms
This policy is intended to assist The Friends of Southwark Park in putting commitment into practice. Compliance with this policy will also ensure that volunteers and employees do not commit unlawful acts of discrimination.
The purpose of this policy is to ensure that anyone engaging with the work of The Friends of Southwark Park is not treated less favourably as a result of having “protected characteristics” or socio-economic characteristics. It is unlawful to discriminate directly or indirectly in recruitment or employment because of a protected characteristic.
The Friends of Southwark Park aims to provide a working environment and culture which values and recognises difference, pro-actively tackles barriers to inclusion and ensures no individual or group is discriminated against. We are committed to ensuring that we consider equality, diversity and inclusion issues in everything we do, including the development and implementation of organisational policies, strategic planning and other organisation activity and products (including social media).
For more information about what is covered under the Equality Act 2010, please refer to
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/equality-act-2010-guidance