Equinet Training on Combating Discrimination and Promoting Equality: Engaging and Working with Duty Bearers

On 24-25 October 2013 in Zagreb, Equinet, with the support and hosting of the Croatian Office of the Ombudsman, organised a training aiming at combating discrimination and promoting equality by engaging and working with duty bearers.

Agenda and Objectives

The agenda of the training can be accessed below:
EQUINET DUTY BEARERS TRAINING AGENDA

This training aimed at sharing experiences and exploring effective approaches and activities equality bodies can put in place to encourage and support duty bearers in implementing good equality practices and to support a wider culture of rights. Duty bearers are identified for the purposes of this training as state or non-state actors with legal obligations to respect the principle of equal treatment, including employers, service providers, public authorities and social partners.

This training was based on the work of the Equinet Working Group Strategy Development and it was also informed by the two good practice guides developed by Equinet in this field (on promoting equality in the workplace and in service provision, respectively).

The training strived to enhance the knowledge of staff members in the following areas:

– Specific obligations for duty bearers
– Guiding principles of engaging with duty bearers
– The range of potential tools Equality Bodies can use when engaging and working with duty bearers
– Good practice examples of projects by Equality Bodies in engaging and working with duty bearers

Target audience

Participation in this Equinet training was reserved to staff members of national equality bodies who deal with or have a special interest in engaging and working with duty bearers, such as employers and service providers, under the equal treatment legislation.

Contributions

SESSION 1 – Equality Bodies’ work with duty bearers

– Sandra Konstatzky: Introducing the work of Equinet on engaging with duty bearers

SESSION 2 – Plenary and ‘speed dating session’

– Eileen Lavery: Presentation on specific obligations for duty bearers

SESSION 3 – Guidelines for engaging with duty bearers

– Denis Roth-Fichet: Guidelines for engaging with duty bearers

– Panel discussion: Contribution from the perspective of duty bearers – what’s in it for a duty bearer? What works and what does not work?
Lina Lopes: Workers’ General Union, Portugal

SESSION 4 – Effective tools for engaging with duty bearers

– Cathal Kelly: Categorisation of different tools and contexts in which they can be used

Outcome and follow-up

The fruitful discussions during the training will also contribute to the comprehensive report on the topic that will be prepared and published by Equinet through its Working Group Strategy Development by the end of 2013. Equinet members and all other stakeholders are encouraged to use this upcoming report and the learnings from the training in their work at the national level.