Housing Cladding Remediation (Scotland) Bill: equality impact assessment - easy read

Cladding Redemption Bill - Equality Impact Assessment (EQIA)

This document looks at the impact of this bill. It should be read with the Childrens Rights and Wellbeing Impact assessment and the Business and Regulatory Impact Assessment.

The Grenfell Tower fire in 2017 showed how dangerous some cladding on UK buildings are.

A lot of changes have been made in Scotland because of this. This included changing Fire Safety laws to ban certain cladding.

Cladding is an outside cover on buildings. Lots of buildings have different cladding.

Scottish Ministers set up a group in 2020. This was to look at problems owners and residents faced about their buildings.

The group wrote a report in 2021 that suggested creating assessments on whole buildings. This would assess the risk of fire.

The group set up to do this is called the Cladding Remediation Programme.

The programme will help find out what buildings have dangerous cladding. It will also help people remove the cladding.

It will help make a list of buildings that have been assessed. It will also list any changes that need to be made.

The Cladding Remediation Programme will help the country improve buildings with problematic cladding on them. It will also make sure:

• We all live in safe and inclusive communities
• Grow up in safe places
• Have businesses that have good pay and work
• Are protected from discrimination

Equalities might be affected by the work the programme will do. This assessment will consider this.

This assessment considers all the groups the programme might affect. These include:

• Age
• Disability
• Marriage and Civil Partnership
• Sex
• Gender reassignment
• Sexual Orientation
• Race
• Religion

The Scottish Government does not want anyone to face discrimination in this programme.

The Equality Act 2010 makes it illegal to discriminate at work and in the community.

There could be some groups affected by the programme.

Older people might live in buildings with unsafe cladding. They may need to leave if their safety is at risk.

They must be given help to leave and find somewhere else to go if needed.

Young people might be affected if they are moved away from school or friends. They should be talked to about this and helped.

Disabled people may be badly affected by the works in progress. They must be helped to move somewhere safer when needed.

People who have changed genders should not be affected by the work.

People who are married also should not face any difficulties because of the programme.

Pregnant people might be affected by the work. Residents must be told if they have to move to avoid difficulties.

People from ethnic minority groups might need information in another language. There should be ways to give them information.

Religious people are not likely to be affected by the programme.

People should not be affected by the programme because of sex.

People also likely will not be affected because of their sexuality.

A Single Building Assessment may be needed for a building. This could affect some people.

Older and younger people might be affected. People with disabilities or who are pregnant might be too.

People from ethnic minorities might need extra information. Nobody else should be affected.

A list of buildings that have been assessed may have to be made. This will only be for Scottish ministers and should not affect anybody.

A Responsible Developers Scheme may be made for developers. Nobody else should be affected by this.

There are potential problems about how the programme will affect people. There are ways to solve them.

Anything about the project that might affect people must be shared with them.

There is not any evidence that the programme discriminates.

Any impacts from the bill will be closely watched. This is to help know what the good and bad parts of the programme are.