Disability Discrimination

Under the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 (DDA), it is unlawful for employers to discriminate against employees and job applicants who have disabilities. The Act is similar to the other discrimination statutes and contains some distinct additional features, one being the positive duty on employers to make reasonable adjustments to support any job applicant or employee who has a disability.

Unlike the other discrimination laws, it is permissible under the DDA to afford a disabled employee more favourable treatment than other employees and such favourable treatment cannot be construed as discrimination against employees who are not disabled.

A disabled person, under the provisions of the Act, is someone with a physical or mental impairment, which has a substantial, adverse and long-term affect on their ability to carry out day-to-day activities. Physical impairment is not defined in the DDA, but includes impairments that affect the senses, e g hearing, sight - (see list below).

To qualify as a disability, the person's impairment must also affect one of the following:

• Perception of the risk of physical danger
• Manual dexterity
• Mobility
• Physical co-ordination
• Incontinence
• Speech, hearing or eyesight
• The ability to lift, carry, or move everyday objects
• Memory or ability to concentrate, learn or understand

An individual with a disability is protected by the Act even if his condition is fully controlled by medication or correcting device, e.g. a hearing aid and he experiences only minor ill-effects when taking the medication or using the correcting device. The one exception to this is eyesight, as an individual with a slight impairment which is correctable either by the use of spectacles or contact lenses will not be classed as disabled in law.

People with mental illnesses will no longer need to show that their condition is clinically well recognised in order to fall within the scope of the Act. In addition, people diagnosed with HIV, multiple sclerosis and certain forms of cancer will be deemed disabled from the point of diagnosis, irrespective of how the condition is affecting them at that point of time, e.g. remission, or the future prognosis.