Free speech champion Lord Toby Young has slammed Labour’s plans to introduce a “banter ban” within their Employment Rights Bill. Speaking in his maiden speech in the House of Lords, Lord Young expressed his concern for the future of pubs if the law comes into force.
Within Labour’s Employment bill is a clause that expands employer liability for third-party (non-sexual) indirect harassment of employees. This, in effect, puts publicans at risk if the freedom of speech of customers is deemed to infringe upon the rights of staff not to feel “harassed” by comments said indirectly. Lord Young went as far as to suggest that some pubs might have to hire “banter bouncers” to police the policy and remove those deemed to have fallen foul.
He said: “How will publicans be expected to protect their employees from overhearing conversations in pubs by customers that they may find offensive or upsetting in virtue of their protected characteristics?
“When it was suggested in the other place that pubs might have to employ banter bouncers to police the conversations of customers as one of the reasonable steps that publicans are expected to take to protect their employees from indirect harassment, it was met by derisive, dismissive laughter by the government benches as a ludicrous straw man.
“But I don’t think that it is a straw man. Before you dismiss that concern as unduly alarmist, I draw your attention to the briefing published earlier this week by the equality and human rights commission which pointed out that ‘employers will have to balance the rights of third parties to express their legally protected beliefs with the rights of their employees not to be harassed.’”
The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) has acknowledged that many of the reforms have “the potential to reduce workplace inequalities”.
The watchdog believes that it supports plans to protect workers from sexual harassment, something it says is a “significant issue”, especially for young people and those in customer-facing roles.
However, it has raised concerns about other forms of discrimination, citing concerns that “it could disproportionately curtail the right to freedom of expression”.
Ministers have admitted that this could be the case, especially in instances where there are “areas of legitimate debate which are carried out in a contentious manner”.
The Government believes that the threshold of what constitutes harassment is high, meaning that mere discussion of a contentious subject would not be enough to cross the line and constitute harassment.
Currently, its definition states that harassment is: “Unwanted conduct that has the purpose or effect of violating the recipient’s dignity or creating an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment.”
The EHRC has urged ministers to continue working to strike a balance to ensure protection for workers does not come at the expense of freedom of expression.
