Disability Discrimination Act 1995 - Principles

Principles

The DDA 1995 departed from the fundamental principles of older UK discrimination law (the Sex Discrimination Act 1975 and the Race Relations Act 1976). These Acts, also repealed and replaced by the Equality Act 2010, made direct discrimination and indirect discrimination unlawful. However, these concepts are insufficient to deal with the issues of disability discrimination.

The core concepts in the DDA 1995 are, instead:

• less favourable treatment for a reason related to a disabled person's disability; and
• failure to make a "reasonable adjustment".

"Reasonable adjustment" or, as it is known in some other jurisdictions, 'reasonable accommodation', is the radical concept that makes the DDA 1995 so different from the older legislation. Instead of the rather passive approach of indirect discrimination (where someone can take action if they have been disadvantaged by a policy, practice or criterion that a body with duties under the law has adopted), reasonable adjustment is an active approach that requires employers, service providers etc to take steps to remove barriers from disabled people's participation. For example:

• employers are likely to find it reasonable to provide accessible IT equipment;
• many shops are likely to find it reasonable to make their premises accessible to wheelchair users;
• councils are likely to find it reasonable to provide information in alternative formats (such as large print) as well as normal written form.

The Disability Rights Commission's Codes of Practice give more information to bodies with duties on assessing whether a particular adjustment is reasonable. In general, the factors to consider would include:

• whether the proposed adjustment would meet the needs of the disabled person;
• whether the adjustment is affordable;
• whether the adjustment would have a serious effect on other people.

Sometimes there may be no reasonable adjustment, and the outcome is that a disabled person is treated less favourably. For example, if a person was not able to understand the implications of entering into a mortgage or loan agreement, and they did not have anyone authorised to act for them, it would not make sense to require a bank or building society to enter into that agreement. The Act therefore permits employers and service providers to justify less favourable treatment (and in some instances failure to make a reasonable adjustment) in certain circumstances.

An example would be a medieval castle open for public tours that didn't have modifications made for wheelchairs. To do so would destroy the castle's historical aspects such as the restrictive nature of the original circular staircases.

The system of protection of disabled people, especially those with mental health problems to keep their homes, has been greatly enhanced by certain recent rulings in the UK Court of Appeal—City of Manchester v Romano – .

Under the act it is unlawful to discriminate against a disabled person by evicting them or subjecting them to other detriment unless justified under the limited number of justifications set out in the act.

In practice the only relevant justification is that the landlord believes and also that it is objectively necessary for the protection of the health or safety of the disabled person or someone else

Where the cause of the taking of proceedings is e.g. rent arrears which was caused by the disability e.g. by Housing Benefit being cancelled through non response to correspondence and the non response was caused by the disability Then not only is it discrimination it is discrimination which cannot be justified on the grounds allowed in the act. This applies whether or not the landlord knew of the disability. This applies even if

the landlord has a mandatory ground for possession, e.g.

2 months rent arrears or

2 months notice no reason in cases of assured shorthold tenancy where the actual reason is rent arrears

the tenancy is one where there is no statutory system of protection, e.g.

where in LA temporary accommodation under the homelessness duty

the tenacy is a business tenancy

The tenant may counterclaim and seek an injunction restraining the landlord from continuing the possession proceedings

The judges were very worried about the extent of the law and urged the UK parliament to change it. However there has since been a new act of parliament and there was no weakening of this protection.