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Equality Duties
There is a wealth of research and practice based experience that
shows bullying can be racist, homophobic or sexist, and
targeted at children and young people with disabilities or special
needs.
Where bullying is discriminatory, the
underlying attitudes and values that are informing the behaviour
need to be addressed. Equality officers and other relevant staff
have an important part to play in advising how best to develop and
monitor anti-bullying strategies to ensure they tackle
discrimination.
A number of local authorities have developed and
published guidance and materials for schools and the
wider community that relate directly to the equality
strands.
The Safe
to Learn suite of guidance also directly addressed identity
based bullying including:
- Bullying around racism, religion and
culture
- Homophobic bullying
- Bullying Involving Children with Special Educational
Needs and Disabilities
- Sexual, sexist and transphobic
bullying
The Equality Strategy - Building a Fairer Britain, December
2010 outlines the coalition government approach to
equality. In relation to bullying this includes:
- work with anti-bullying organisations with a proven track
record of tackling prejudice-based bullying, to support schools in
tackling all forms of bullying, including homophobic and
transphobic bullying.
Anti-bullying practitioners must ensure
they familiarise themselves with changing legislation in this area,
and relate this directly to their work. All agencies,
including schools, must have regard for their duties and
obligations under existing legislation. A good way to keep up
to date is to regularly visit the website of the Equality and Human Rights
Commission.