SOLAS strives to proactively prevent and eliminate discrimination and inequality in the workplace, promote equality of opportunity, and protect the human rights and treatment of its staff, service users, customers, and everyone affected by its policies and procedures. It is committed to embedding human rights and equality matters across its organisational functions. 

This commitment is now strengthened by a legal obligation called the Public Sector Equality and Human Rights Duty, which has come about as a result of the Irish Human Rights and Equality Act 2014.

The Public Sector Equality and Human Rights Duty places equality and human rights at the heart of how public bodies carry out their functions, with the potential to positively transform how public bodies engage and interact with their own staff and the wider public.

Specifically, public bodies are required to implement three steps:

• Assess: establish issues that affect identified groups and that are relevant to the functions of public sector body organisations.

• Address: Review, update or develop plans and policies at the final draft or review stage to establish what actions will be taken to address issues identified by public sector bodies and outline what additional actions need to be included to advance equality and human rights issues. 

• Report:  Public Sector organisations will report each year on developments and achievements made to address and progress the implementation of the Duty. 

In 2021, SOLAS began its journey to work toward implementing the Duty. A working group was formed with fifteen staff from ten units in SOLAS and engagement with our Senior Leadership Team began. Under the guidance of Values Lab, the working group developed five equality and human rights benchmarks that have emerged as part of its Implementation Plan using a values-led approach, developing a series of objectives and outcomes to embed the Duty in its processes. 

As a result of our commitment to work towards implementing the Duty, SOLAS have published an Implementation Plan and Action Plan which can be found below.

SOLAS is a leader in its commitment to progress and implement the Duty to a high standard, and to meet its objectives and ambitions. We are continually working to embed the Duty through working groups, annual work plans, and progress reports, made accessible to the public. SOLAS will report on progress, achievements and key moments made to advance the Duty in our annual report, policies, corporate plan, and wider strategic plans, while our working group will continue to guide, develop and monitor the successful implementation of the Public Sector Equality and Human Rights Duty. 

To learn more about the Public Sector Equality and Human Rights Duty please visit here: https://www.ihrec.ie/our-work/public-sector-duty/

For queries related to SOLAS and the Public Sector Equality and Human Rights Duty, please email publicsectorduty@solas.ie.