Equality Objectives 2012–2016
Since April 2012, the Public Sector Equality Duty has required us to set one or more
equality objectives at least every four years. It also requires us to publish information
regarding equality, locally. This paper outlines local information and achievements
between 2012 and 2016.
Our values are embedded in our Corporate Strategy • Fairness and integrity in all
that we do • Responsibility for our actions • Respect and support for each other.
Our corporate strategy 2014 – 2019 commits us to: “Improve people’s lives by
providing excellent public services that represent good value for money and meet
our communities’ needs, with an operational priority of public service excellence,
putting the Customer at the centre of everything we do”.
You can find updates on our Corporate Strategy in our EHDC Annual Report.
Corporate Equality Objectives 2012 – 2016
In January 2012 four corporate equality objectives were agreed and set, as listed
below:
1. To continue to use impact assessments to help us pay due regard to equality
through any policy or service change.
2. To monitor diversity of customers, where appropriate, to help us understand
what type of people are accessing our services, to help us understand their
needs and to see what type of people are not accessing our services to help
us identify why.
3. To monitor the diversity of staff where appropriate, to help us to establish a
diverse workforce that represents the people we serve.
4. Increase employment opportunities for younger people locally - both within the
Council and within local businesses (as we have identified under
representation).
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What we have achieved between 2012 – 2016
The corporate equality objectives are listed below with updates of what we have
achieved alongside:
1. To continue to use impact assessments to help us pay due regard to
equality through any policy or service change: Integrated Impact
Assessments have been developed and are used throughout our business.
They include various topics as well as “due regard” to equality for staff and
customers. Assessments are on-going, we use them whenever we are
thinking or planning changes. Where identified, any necessary subsequent
Customer Equality Impact Assessments are carried out. Outcomes of these
assessments are included in reports for decision making. Some examples of
assessment outcomes include:

Protecting all groups within our localised Council Tax Support Scheme
(benefiting families, single parents, disabled people and those on a low
income).

Our new Energy Strategy is helping to promote vibrant, inclusive and
cohesive communities, working in partnership to develop and deliver
local energy projects as well as help to tackle disadvantage which
arises from households in fuel poverty. The primary focus is on energy
efficiency schemes to improve the warmth of homes as well as to work
with local education providers to promote the benefits of working in the
energy sector with young people.

Our new Leisure Strategy has three key outcomes for service delivery,
based on the impact assessment we carried out. Firstly to maintain and
continuously improve the current quality of service provision, secondly
to improve all customer participation in sport and physical activity and
thirdly to have provision for pricing concessions for disadvantaged
groups. Accessibility requirements must meet the Sport England
guidance.
During 2015 we added a new assessment topic to our Integrated Impact
Assessments to help us pay due regard to the need to prevent people from
being drawn into terrorism.
2. To monitor diversity of customers, where appropriate, to help us
understand what type of people are accessing our services, to help us
understand their needs and to see what type of people are not
accessing our services to help us identify why: The Census 2011 showed
that there are 115,608 people living in East Hampshire, 93% of whom are
white British, (please use the link for a further ethnicity breakdown). 51.4% of
the population are female, 64.7% are Christian, with people citing “no religion”
is the fastest growing group since the last Census in 2001, currently at 26.3%
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(please use the link for a further religion breakdown). 14.9% of the population
declared that their day to day activities are either limited a little or a lot by
disability, more disability data and further health profile information. East
Hampshire has a median age of 44 where the national median age is 39
years Age breakdown.
Some of our Services collect customer equality data (where appropriate) such
as our Housing Team, Benefits Team, Residents Survey and Consultations.
Census data and Hampshire County Council District Profiles are also linked to
our website for the benefit of staff and customers.
3. To monitor the diversity of staff where appropriate, to help us to
establish a diverse workforce that represents the people we serve. We
collect and analyse Human Resource's equality data on staff, to produce an
annual workforce profile. This is used in a variety of ways, for example to
identify whether we reflect the community we serve (indeed this process led
us to agreeing Equality Objective 4 below) and also, for example, to assist us
with internal impact assessments, to understand what groups of staff will be
affected by any proposed changes to help us identify their needs through that
process.
We also collect valuable staff "insight" (relating to staff's thoughts and
experiences in the workplace) in our staff survey. 59% of staff said they were
satisfied with the Council as an employer in 2013; this had risen to 90% in
2015. The 2015 staff survey results showed 80.9% of respondents said they
had not experienced unfair treatment in the workplace however 12.3% said
they had and 6.8% preferred not to say. With regard to unwanted behaviour in
the workplace 87.5% of respondents in 2015 said they had not experienced
this; however 7.2% said they had experienced it and 5.3% preferred not to
say. These questions were changed slightly from the 2013 question and
therefore cannot be compared with previous staff surveys. We will monitor the
new set of questions in future surveys.
EHDC Staff profile
Group
Jan 2012
Jan 2015
Jan 2016
Gender
66% female
65% female
63% female
Disability
3%
1%
1%
Over the last four years, there has been a slow decline in the percentage of
females to males in the workforce profile. There has also been a decline in the
number of staff not reporting a disability which needs further investigation.
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Staff Age Groups
2016 has seen a decrease in the proportions of employees in the 36 – 45 and
56-65 age brackets but an increase in the proportions of employees in the 1625, 26-35 and 46-55 age brackets. 46-55 remains the age bracket with the
highest proportion of employees with 31% and 32% of employees sitting
within this range over the last two counts respectively.
Staff ethnicity
There has been a significant decline in the number of staff reporting their
ethnicity which hinders this data set and warrants further investigation.
Councillor Representation
In March 2015 East Hampshire District Council was made up of 67% male
Councillors and 33% female Councillors.
4. Increase employment opportunities for younger people locally - both
within the Council (as we have identified under representation) this is
with regard to 18-26 year olds.
The community profile for 18-25 year olds in East Hampshire was 11% based
on the Census 2011. In 2012 our staff diversity profile showed we employed
less than half that percentage in our workforce (5.9%) so it was agreed in
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2012 to concentrate on raising that figure in order to support a more
representative workforce. In 2013 we ran our first internal Apprenticeship
Scheme, employing three young people one of whom has secured full time
employment with the Council since. In the summer of 2015 we ran our second
Apprenticeship Scheme, employing a further three people all of whom are still
working for the Council. In December 2015 it was agreed that there would be
a further budget for this scheme and therefore there are plans to employ a
further three apprentices from the summer of 2016.
We have created and published a recruitment guide highlighting the benefits
of working for East Hampshire District Council and the variety of job roles on
offer. We have attended various Jobs Fairs and we continue to look to
technology and changing communication platforms to improve how we
advertise our job vacancies. As part of National Apprenticeship Week (March
2016) current apprentices have visited local schools and colleges to talk to
people about the benefits of apprenticeships and the development
opportunities they have received since starting their apprenticeships with the
council last year. We have also increased our use of social media in
advertising vacancies.
In January 2016 our staff profile of 18-25 year olds had risen to 7% (from
5.9% in 2012) we recognise this is moving in the right positive direction and
that there is still some way to go in reflecting the 11% community profile of
this age group.
The EHDC Strategy for Business has an “Apprenticeship grants programme”
for Businesses in the District and is so far supporting 24 individuals and also
securing local employment and training opportunities through Section
106 agreements.
Additional Equality work across the Council’s Teams 2012-2016
In addition to the work towards corporate equality objectives further equality work
has been delivered between 2012- 2016, through specialist council service areas,
such as:
 Community Safety Team: working with Troubled Families and Safe Place
Scheme (using shops and local businesses as a “safe haven” for people with
learning difficulties/vulnerable and older people).
 Prevent work (counter terrorism duty) raising awareness with staff and
partners and including questions regarding it within our impact assessments.
 Communities: Supporting and coordinating the Rural Area Play Project for
children.
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 Supporting East Hampshire Disability Forum.
 Delivering “Butserfest”, a drug and alcohol free – an annual music festival for
young people.

Supporting the East Hampshire Youth Council.
 Staff and Councillor learning opportunities – we have a new mandatory e
learning Equality and Diversity course for all staff and we have now also
produced one for Councillors. We have provided face to face learning
opportunities with regard to raising awareness of different disabilities, different
cultures, race, religion, lesbian gay bisexual and transgender and we have
provided bullying and harassment workshops.
 In the last three years we have committed to understanding the local impact of
the national Welfare Reform Project by carrying out local research annually.
 Gypsy and Traveller Health research Project – has been completed which
included engaging with this community. East Hampshire has the third largest
Gypsy and Traveller population in Hampshire.
 Disability in Employment Seminar EHDC Civic Day 2012 – raising awareness
of the benefits of employing disabled people and the barriers they face in
applying for work as well as in the workplace.
 The formation of an engaged Staff Focus Group working with staff and
Management Teams.
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