Employment Equality Act, 1998

Other Matters

Equality clause relating to gender issues.

21.— (1) If and so far as the terms of a contract of employment do not include (expressly or by reference to a collective agreement or otherwise) a gender equality clause, they shall be taken to include one.

(2) A gender equality clause is a provision relating to the terms of a contract of employment, other than a term relating to remuneration or pension rights, which has the effect that if—

(a) A is employed in circumstances where the work done by A is not materially different from that done by B in the same employment, and

(b) at any time A's contract of employment would (but for the gender equality clause)—

(i) contain a term which is or becomes less favourable to A than a term of a similar kind in B's contract of employment, or

(ii) not include a term corresponding to a term in B's contract of employment which benefits B,

then the terms of A's contract of employment shall be treated as modified so that the term in question is not less favourable to A or, as the case may be, so that they include a similar term benefiting A.

(3) A gender equality clause shall not operate in relation to a difference between A's contract of employment and B's contract of employment if the employer proves that the difference is genuinely based on grounds other than the gender ground.

(4) Without prejudice to the generality of section 8 (1), where a person offers A employment on certain terms and, were A to accept the offer on those terms, the gender equality clause in A's contract of employment would have the effect of modifying the terms in either of the ways specified in subsection (2), the making of the offer shall be taken to amount to discrimination against A on the gender ground in relation to A's conditions of employment.