Our first ever single equality scheme – the Diversity and Equality Scheme 2009 – 2012 brought together our race, gender and disability equality schemes. In addition, this covers the three strands of age, religion and belief and sexual orientation.

The scheme:
• Defines the Council’s policy around equality and diversity.
• Ensures that the policy meets the Council’s legal requirements around the six equality strands.
• Shows how the Council can reach the ‘Excellent’ standard of the Local Government Equality Framework. 

• Outlines the following five strategic priority areas for achieving equality:
• Service delivery
• Accessibility
• Communication and consultation
• Employment
• Partnership working
The executive summary and full versions of the scheme can be accessed by the links on the right of this page.

Diversity and Equality Action Plan
To ensure we meet the requirements of our scheme we have developed an action plan.  This can be accessed by clicking the link on the right hand side of the screen.