What personal characteristics are deemed worthy of protection?
The Equality Act 2010 recognises a defined list of personal attributes that the law currently recognises as requiring statutory protection: sex, race, disability, age, sexual orientation, religion and belief, marriage and civil partnership, gender assignment, pregnancy and maternity.
Set out in this structure, it can be easy to forget that this list is not set in stone, but has been developed over the last 50 years to reflect changing societal norms, demography, and cultural attitudes. Equally, therefore, the future of anti-discrimination legislation requires a constant assessment whether, and how, this list might be expanded to protect minorities and eliminate prejudice.
The area where this has been most apparent in recent years is the Tribunal’s attempts to define the boundaries of religious or philosophical beliefs. Despite needing to meet a fairly robust threshold (see the Grainger test below) we have seen decisions granting protected status to environmentalism and belief in climate change, ethical veganism (but not vegetarianism), a belief in the sanctity of life (in the context of an anti-fox hunting stance), gender critical beliefs (that a person’s sex was a biological fact); and even a belief in the ‘higher purpose’ of public service broadcasting.
Despite the quasi-religious devotion of some football fans, supporting a football club was not, however, deemed to be a protected belief (at least, not in the case of Rangers FC). Nor will a belief be protected if it is deemed to be incompatible with human dignity or the fundamental rights of others. Consequently, in the recent case of Thomas v Surrey and Borders Partnership, the Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) ruled that a belief in English nationalism, (which included a desire to forcibly remove Muslims from the UK), was not a protected belief.
Outside the scope of philosophical beliefs, a few recent cases are testing the boundaries of how the current list of protected characteristics should be defined, and what other qualities might deserve protection…
Baldness
In Finn v British Bung Manufacturing Company, following a heated workplace altercation, the Claimant was called a “bald c**t”. The Tribunal upheld a claim that this comment amounted to sex-related harassment, finding that baldness is a predominantly male issue. In dismissing the employer’s appeal, the EAT confirmed that it did not matter that women could also suffer from baldness – in order to be protected, the characteristic did not have to apply to one gender to the total exclusion of the other.
Accents
In Carozzi v University of Hertfordshire, the Claimant was a Brazilian national who brought a claim for racial harassment following negative comments about her accent. The claim initially failed, the ET accepting that the comments were not motivated by race, but by concerns over the Claimant’s intelligibility or comprehensibility when communicating. However, the EAT overturned this and upheld the claim, finding firstly (and unsurprisingly) that an accent may be an important part of a person’s national or ethnic identity, and was therefore ‘related to’ race. Secondly, that racial motivation (conscious or unconscious) was not a pre-requisite for harassment – the “related to” test for harassment is wider than the “because of” test that applies to direct discrimination.
So what about regional UK accents? Scottish, Welsh or Irish accents are likely to be protected under race discrimination laws, which covers national origins. However, English regional accents currently receive no such protection, despite significant evidence of workplace bias against certain dialects, both in terms of geographical original (Scousers, Brummies, Geordies) and social-economic status (‘working class’ vs ‘posh’ accents). There are potentially alternative remedies for employees who are subject to bullying over their accent, but those are of little use if the individual gets sifted out at the recruitment stage.
There is a strong argument to extend statutory protection to such accents. Back in 2026, Lady Hale, sitting in the House of Lords, described a ‘protected characteristic’ as “either immutable or so fundamental to human dignity that a person should not be compelled to change it“. Regional accents would seem fit into that category, yet a 2021 petition to extend the Equality Act to regional accents only received 38 signatures, so change may still be a little way off.
Hair Colour / Texture
A similar conversation is taking place in relation to hair colour, style and texture.
Afro-textured hair is protected due to its association with its race or ethnicity. Nevertheless, on 10 September 2024, World Afro Day launched a campaign to make this protection more explicit under the Equality Act.
Hair colour, on the other hand, remains “one of the last socially accepted forms of prejudice against people for a trait they were born with” (according to Chrissy Meleady, CEO of Equalities and Human Rights UK).
Red hair or ‘gingerism’ is not explicitly protected under the Equality Act. There is an argument that it might be protected under existing race discrimination laws, as being related to ethic and/or national Celtic origins, but we are unaware of this being tested in court. The petition for this cause fared slightly better, with 94 signatures, but far from a triumph.
As a questionable consolation, 12 January has been designated ‘Kiss a Ginger Day’. (TJD Law does not condone or endorse the kissing of any party without informed consent!!).
The Grainger Test
To qualify for protection:
- The belief must be genuinely held.
- It must be a belief, not an opinion or viewpoint based on the present state of information available.
- It must be a belief as to a weighty and substantial aspect of human life and behaviour.
- It must attain a certain level of cogency, seriousness, cohesion and importance.
- It must be worthy of respect in a democratic society, not be incompatible with human dignity and not conflict with the fundamental rights of others.
Grainger plc and others v Nicholson [2010] IRLR 4