Social Inclusion Horizontal Principle Reporting Template. For the period Jan. to Dec. 2010

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1 Social Inclusion Horizontal Principle Reporting Template For the period Jan. to Dec Name of Activity: No.: ESF What actions have taken place over the last year to incorporate the principle of social inclusion into the Activity? (Examples: new objective created; new indicator developed; altered project selection criteria; collecting new data or collecting it in different way; pursuing case studies; carrying out impact assessments; interpreting existing data in a different way; gender proofing exercises). (a) Ongoing Actions: The objective of this activity is to contribute to addressing labour market gaps for specific groups that are experiencing barriers to participation and employment, including those created by gender inequality and wider inequalities. The programme aims to put in place measures to improve labour market access and participation of groups experiencing inequality across the nine grounds covered by the equality legislation. (b) New Actions: The EMU focused on the following areas of work across 4 strands of activity in 2010: STRAND A: Support Packages to Providers for Programme Providers The Irish Vocational Education Association in co-operation with the EMU developed a new project this year called 'Embedding Equality into Education Plans'. The main aim of this project was to disseminate the key learning from 3 pilot projects that had been previously funded by the Equality Mainstreaming Unit These were: County Dublin VEC Equality Mainstreaming project County Wicklow VEC Equality Mainstreaming project County Waterford VEC Equality Mainstreaming project A number of equality mainstreaming tools were developed by the VECs, including a set of equality mainstreaming guidelines. These tools will be disseminated more broadly within the VEC sector during The pilot projects have generated significant interest within the VEC sector and an increased recognition of the need to develop competency in terms of equality, including at senior management level. With the objective to share and disseminate the learning from these projects funded in 2009 within the VEC sector, the Equality Mainstreaming Unit organised a day-long seminar called Mainstreaming Equality in the VEC sector in May 2010 in collaboration with the Department of Education and Skills, the IVEA and the Further Education Support Services (FESS).

2 As a direct outcome of this learning event, the Irish Vocational Education Association (the umbrella body for VECs) initiated work on a project to provide direct equality mainstreaming supports to a number of VECs. The Equality Mainstreaming Unit set up a panel of equality and further education trainers to work with a number of VECs in building capacity for equality mainstreaming. The training package covered a minimum of equality awareness, understanding of the impact of inequality on the lives of people across the nine grounds and on their educational and labour market opportunities & outcomes, equality mainstreaming principles and equality mainstreaming action planning. The participating VECs were Co. Wicklow VEC, Co. Mayo VEC, Co. Galway VEC, Co. Louth VEC and South Tipperary VEC, for a total of approximately 100 participants. The support packages were positively evaluated and initiated equality action plans on aspects of service delivery in all the participating VECs The Equality Mainstreaming Unit also supported Co. Louth VEC to carry out an equality mainstreaming project which focussed on undertaking an initial assessment on how the VEC could best support the integration of adult Travellers into its mainstream programmes. The assessment was conducted through revision of existing practices, policies and programmes as well through the consultation with Travellers' representatives and staff. The assessment identified some of the barriers to Traveller participation into mainstream further education and programmes provided by the VEC, revised what programmes might best meet Travellers' needs, and drafted an initial action plan for the VEC with a view to put in place meaningful supports and positive action initiatives to ensure Travellers' participation and outcomes into its mainstream programmes. This report and a good practice action plan will be available in The Measure Advisory Committee met twice during The membership is comprised of representatives of labour market, education and training providers and representatives from across the nine grounds covered by the equality legislation. Strand B Activity: Support to Enterprises There are 2 elements to this activity. Firstly, 38 SMEs were supported during 2010 to develop planned and systematic approaches to equality in the workplace. 22 enterprises from the SME region were supported while the remaining 16 were from the BMW region. Of the 3409 employees spread across the 38 SMEs, 1672 were male and 1737 were female. The second element of activity under this strand is developing and supporting sectoral approaches to promoting equality in the workplace.

3 The 5 successful projects were:- 1. EMU Stand B: Irish University Association's Equality Network This project will collaboratively pilot a tailored elearning programme covering all nine grounds of discrimination under Irish equality legislation. 2. EMU Strand B: CMP-Commercial Mushroom Producers and SIPTU This is a new partnership project proposal between the CMP and SIPTU with a specific focus on migrant women working in the mushroom industry. This project aims to review existing employment policies and procedures to ensure compliance with equality legislation, provide an accessible information resource by the translation of key documents, policies and procedures and provide equality related training to frontline management and workers. 3. EMU Strand B: IBEC This project proposes to develop a template for an equal pay audit. This template will be piloted within the manufacturing sector as the ESRI (2009) had found a significant 13.9 per cent adjusted wage gap in this sector. Following the pilot phase the template will be adjusted if necessary and subsequently promoted. 4. EMU Strand B: Gay and Lesbian Equality Network This project proposes to develop, pilot and disseminate a high quality interactive online self assessment lesbian, gay and bisexual diversity tool for employers in the financial services and information technologies sectors. In piloting the tool GLEN will work with minimum of 10 employers. Project partners include Irish Bank Officials Organisation and IBEC. 5. EMU Strand C: One Family This project proposes to develop and disseminate a best practice tool-kit to employing lone parents. It will work with 3 major pioneer and ambassador retailers, Marks and Spencer, Boots plc and Superquinn. The will establish a project scrutiny panel with members from Marks and Spencer, Boots, Superquinn and Retail Ireland (IBEC). The project will have a pilot-phase and 2 pilot train the trainer regional sessions delivered with city centre retailer associations in Cork and limerick. Strand C: Supports to Trade Unions and Employer Networks In 2009, the EMU invited expressions of interest from trade union and employer networks to develop projects to encourage, inform and support planned and systematic approaches to workplace equality that were carried out during Congress, SIPTU and IBEC were successful in their applications SIPTU Mainstreaming Equality for Migrant Women The project development and delivery was carried out by SIPTU and the Migrant Rights Centre Ireland (MRCI) in a joint effort to improve conditions for workers in the agriculture sector. Through this project SIPTU created a better partnership approach with the Migrant Rights Centre, (a non-governmental organisation) but also with the Commercial Mushroom Producers (CMP and others) who were involved in the project through meetings and equality awareness sessions. As a result of this project, the mushroom industry committed to reach full compliance with the Registered Employment Agreement.

4 The mains project outcomes were as follows: 759 migrant women mushroom pickers mobilised to participate in collective activity that included discussion of their experiences, decision-making and planning, and collective action to challenge problems on the worksite and across the industry. o Migrant women mushroom workers supported to take leadership roles with their peers and in dealing with farm management and industry peers. 93 new members signed up (all migrant women). 25 shop stewards elected on mushroom farms, to increase SIPTU s capacity to support and communicate with membership on farms. o Three equality informational and capacity-enhancing sessions were delivered to employers, industry groups, and stakeholders. Outcomes included strengthened relationships and the identification of areas of collaboration and partnership to counter communication challenges and improve equality outcomes. o The project also produced a video as a learning tool on best practice for mobilising and building participation towards equality. The video will be used as a learning tool for SIPTU trainings of staff and members. o A Training module on equality was developed and integrated into training for key union staff and personnel. Equality training piloted with SIPTU legal staff who interface directly with migrants, women, and others groups covered by the 9 grounds in the equality legislation. EMU Strand C: Congress Equality Mainstreaming As part of its project Congress developed and delivered an equality mainstreaming training course for affiliated organisations. An equality resource on how to support Unions in representing members taking equality cases was updated. A trade union resource on LGBT issues at work was produced in partnership with GLEN and TENI. In addition a challenge fund was established to assist unions in developing equality mainstreaming projects. For this project, Congress established one challenge fund of 5,000. This was awarded to SIPTU to support work to implement their rule change demanding equality impact assessments and involved the delivery of 3 equality mainstreaming training days to equality champions within in SIPTU and the development of an Equality Network support equality competency within SIPTU. EMU Strand C: IBEC Supporting equality and diversity initiatives in the Private sector IBEC developed and launched a maternity and patenting tool kit for the workplace. This resource contains tools and guidance for positively managing maternity and parenting in the work place. Tools included are: a pre-maternity leave checklist a post-maternity leave workshop a guide for managers in dealing positively with pregnant employees IBEC also produced a diversity audit e-tool which supports organisations to assess their equality and diversity comepetence.

5 Strand D Activity : Research and Resource Publication: Equality in a Time of Change: Mainstreaming Equality in Further Education, training and labour market programmes", Conference Papers The Equality Mainstreaming Unit produced the publication "Equality in a Time of Change: Mainstreaming Equality in Further Education, training and labour market programmes" which collates conference papers from the annual Equality Mainstreaming conferences The annual equality mainstreaming conference was held on November 9th 2010 in Dublin Castle. The conference theme was Mainstreaming Equality: Promoting equality and accommodating diversity in further education, training and labour market programmes. 3. Progress against Indicators (where established): (This should be presented if possible in the tabular form laid out below) Indicator Baseline Position Latest Position Number of Enterprises Target to support enterprises supported in Supported enterprises Taking account of the material presented under 2 and 3 above, what contribution is the Activity making to the promotion of social inclusion Examples: Are participation levels of women or men increasing? Are different needs of women and men being addressed? Are different levels of access for women and men being addressed? Are differential outcomes for women and men being measured? By facilitating and supporting institutional change within providers of vocational education and training, labour market programmes and within small to medium enterprises, this measure is contributing to the promotion of social inclusion and the needs of groups experiencing a combination of poverty and inequality will be more systematically identified.

6 5. Identify any issues arising that need to be drawn to the attention of the Managing Authority, the Equal Opportunities and Social Inclusion Coordinating Committee or other Departments Please feel free to attach any relevant additional material to this reporting template. 1 The issues could relate to specific implementation concerns e.g. collection of data, or could relate to more general findings concerning the principle in question e.g. a particular policy in another department is obstructing your Activity from promoting the principle.