InterLaw Diversity Forum for LGBT Networks

Join us for our first annual official PRIDE event. The InterLaw Diversity Forum for LGBT Networks has assembled a lively and distinguished panel to look at what needs to be done to secure real equality for LGBT+ people now that a comprehensive legal framework has been acheived.   This will explore a range of issues which impact the LGBT+ community from anti-violence, homeless and at risk youth, anti-LGBT+ bullying, immigration equality and asylum, age, family and more. 

Special Guest Speakers: 

Tim Hailes, Managing Director & Associate General Counsel , JP Morgan and Alderman, City of London

Fiona Woolf, Future Lord Mayor of London and Partner, CMS Cameron McKenna 

Our world class panel includes: 

Peter Tatchell, the UK’s most high profile and outspoken campaigner for equality

Kath Gillespie Sells, disability and LGBT rights campaigner and founder of REGARD, a national, volunteer led LGBT disability charity

Tim Sigsworth, Chief Executive of the Albert Kennedy Trust, which has seen a 40% increase in homeless and at risk LGBT youth turn to it in the last year

S Chelvan, trailblazing immigration barrister specialising in issues facing LGBT+ asylum seekers and immigrants 

Constable Martin Coughlan, LGBT Liaison Officer, Metropolitan Police

Panel co-chaired by:

Laura Hodgson, Insurance Group, Norton Rose and Committee Member, InterLaw Diversity Forum

Daniel Winterfeldt, Head of International Capital Markets, CMS Cameron McKenna and Founder and Co-Chair, InterLaw Diversity Forum

Date: Thursday 27 June, 6:30 pm to 9:00 pm

Venue: CMS Cameron McKenna, Mitre House, 160 Aldersgate Street EC1A 4 DD

Please RSVP by emailing here and many thanks to our fantastic panel and our generous hosts CMS Cameron McKenna.

Reserve your place by e-mailing us here!  

This month we are at Cleary Gottlieb and we’ll be looking at BAME career progression in the legal sector with a fantastic panel of speakers including:

Jude Brighton, Client Executive, Marsh (Co-Chair of Panel)
Dohn Yu, Associate, CMS
Frances Idehen, Senior Associate, Hogan Lovells

So join us from 18.30 at 

Simmons & Simmons, CityPoint, One Ropemaker Street

Tickets are now on sale for the fun and glamorous Winter Carnival hosted by Sir Ian McKellen at The Club at The Ivy on 24 March. Just click on the W.  

Stonewall Work Equality Index (WEI) Top 100 Employers were announced this month (see the full list here)!  We are very excited that for the first time we have eight law firms in the Top 100 Employers. 

Stonewall will join us to discuss the overall performance of the legal sector this year and give us indications of how law firm participants can improve in the future.

We will also be announcing our annual Top 15 in the Legal Sector list which is co-produced by Stonewall and the InterLaw Diversity Forum to celebrate the top performers in the legal sector in and out of the Top 100 Employers.

That is not all! We will also hear from top performing law firms in the Top 100 Employers to exchange best practice and tips across eight areas of good practice that Stonewall assesses in the Index: 

• employee policy
• employee engagement
• staff training and development
• monitoring
• supplier policy
• LGB community engagement
• the ‘pink plateau’ 
• additional evidence and staff feedback 

Anyone who would like to submit a question in advance can do so by emailing Daniel here.

Please join us from 18.30 at CMS Cameron McKenna, Mitre House, 160 Aldersgate, London EC1A 4DD for this valuable discussion and for networking drinks afterwards. 

Please RSVP by emailing here. 

There are some great events coming up in February to mark LGBT history month.

We’ve worked with the Law Society and others to develop two and booking is now open but places are limited!

11th Annual Stonewall Lecture

5 February, 18.00, The Law Society

From silence to safety: protecting the gay refugee?
Organised by the Law Society and the Bar Council in association with Stonewall, InterLaw Diversity Forum, and the Bar Lesbian and Gay Group.

The lecture will be delivered by S Chelvan, a leading barrister at No 5 Chambers, who has an international reputation in the field of asylum claims based on sexual or gender identity. His model for deermining LGBTI refugee claims is now endorsed by various organisations, including the UNHCR.

Book your free place here.

Being a successful and happy LGB lawyer

27 February, 18.00, The Law Society

The Law Society and its Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual (LGB) steering group are bringing together leading LGB lawyers from across the profession for an evening of career and personal inspiration on 27 February 2013. 
 
Please join us from 6pm until 8.30pm at the Law Society, 113 Chancery Lane, WC2A 1PL for what promises to be a lively and engaging discussion of how LGB people can carve out great careers for themselves and work together with others to make the legal sector more diverse and inclusive

Book your free place here.

The full event listing for LGBT history month is here. 

David Fenton, InterLaw Diversity Forum Committee Member and Partner at Statham Gill Davies, briefs us on the rulings handed down by the ECHR today in the cases of four Christians who were appealing against UK Employment Tribunal findings related to their freedom of expression of their faith. In two of the cases, the individuals had sought to refuse to carry out their normal work duties (as a registrar and a counsellor) when that would involve same-sex couples. 

The ECHR tried to avoid making definitive rules. Instead they went out of their way to show the utmost respect for the rights of the four Christians whose cases were heard together before it even though the outcome was three of them “lost “. It seems they want to avoid there being victory speeches for one group over another.

Instead it was a victory for anti-discrimination rules generally and for emphasising the importance of respecting ALL minorities in the workplace. Arguments had been made that one set of minority rights (in two of the cases those of LGBT people) should not be seen to trump those of Christians. The ruling gave little sense of anyone triumphing over anyone else. Instead the court carried out a very delicate balancing act , making it clear that even with the outcomes themselves, there remains scope for similar circumstances giving different results in the future. It was rather like they asked the question whether the actions  of the four employers concerned in the four cases before the court fell within a “band of reasonable responses” rather than whether they made the only correct decision possible given the conflicting needs of different rights , all of which were held to be extremely deserving of protection. This is similar to the tests which UK Employment Tribunals already use for unfair dismissal cases – not was the employers’ decision the correct or only one , but was it one which a hypothetical reasonable employer could have made.

The Eweida case concerned the right of a BA employee to wear her cross in a visible way rather than under her uniform. The court was clear that Ms Eveida’s desire to manifest her religious belief is a fundamental right and there was no real encroachment on the interests of others. Strong words – “fundamental right.” This will apply to all religious symbols and clothing.

A few lines down the judgement and we see the same “fundamental right” being given equal respect and importance but leading to a different outcome. The second applicant was Ms Chaplin, a nurse, but protection of health and safety in a ward was the reason given for not permitting the chain and cross to be worn –[in case a patient grabbed it or it fell onto a wound.] In this instance the court decided “interference with [Ms Chaplin’s ] freedom to manifest her religion was necessary in a democratic society.” Similarly grandiose words but achieving the opposite outcome.

The third applicant was Ms Ladele, the registrar who believes same sex unions are contrary to God’s will and that it would be wrong for her to participate in the creation of a union equivalent to marriage for a same – sex couple.

The court had some sympathy for Ms Ladele in that when she first became a registrar civil partnerships didn’t exist and so the conflict wasn’t in evidence when she first pursued this career. It was evident though that Islington Council was genuinely strongly committed to pursuing and actively promoting an equal opportunities policy that protected all its employees and the public who used the council’s services and same sex couples who wanted to recognise and protect their relationships as civil partnerships fell within the remit and this was a legitimate aim of the council. Looking at proportionality, the court acknowledged that the consequences for Ms Ladele of losing her job was a serious effect on her, but the council’s aim was  to secure the rights of others who were also protected under the Convention. The Court referred to existing case law that already held that differences in treatment based on sexual orientation require particularly serious reasons by way of justification.

Using wording that makes it clear that a different outcome to Ms Ladele’s complaints against her employer and the UK courts may have been acceptable to the court as well, the Court emphasised that the court generally allows a wide margin of appreciation when it comes to striking a balance between competing Convention rights. The court concluded that Islington Council which brought the disciplinary proceedings against the applicant and the UK EAT and Court of Appeal which rejected her discrimination claims did not exceed the wide margin of appreciation available to them. This is not the clearest of victories for LGBT rights – they are not necessarily saying that the treatment of Ms Ladele was the correct or certainly not the only correct treatment – it just wasn’t wrong in the sense that it had to be overturned by the court. That is quite a negative interpretation of what is a welcome outcome for the LGBT community. One is left wondering if the UK outcomes had been different the court would not have interfered with them either, just so long as both sets of rights had been given thorough and respectful consideration. Also, there aren’t many employers who can demonstrate their equal opportunities policy is at the core of everything they do in the way Islington were able to. The outcome really goes to show how important it is for everyone who wishes to repy upon or justify the implementation of an equal opportunities policy, that it is pursued thoroughly and meaningfully as a core consideration and they can demonstrate this to be the case.

The fourth applicant was Mr McFarlane, the Relate counsellor. He had been dismissed because he had been reluctant to offer psycho sexual counselling to same sex couples as such relationships were contrary to his Christian beliefs. Relate did not want him to be able to cherry pick the couples he saw as a means of avoiding counselling same sex couples and he was dismissed. Unlike the Ladele case there was less sympathy to his plight given that his job had not changed. Mr McFarlane had enrolled on the Relate psycho-sexual counselling course knowing that Relate had an equal opportunities policy that would not allow filtering of clients on the grounds of sexual orientation. Again, the courts had to consider a fair balance between competing interests at stake and acknowledged that losing employment was a high price to pay. Nevertheless, for the court the most important factor was that the employer’s action was intended to secure the implementation of its policy to provide a counselling service to everyone without discrimination.

Thursday 10 January 2013 at 18.00pm at the Law Society, 113 Chancery Lane, London, WC2A 1PL. Jointly organised by the Law Society and the InterLaw Diversity Forum. 

The 8 March 2012 International Women in Law Summit brought together partners in private practice with in-house counsel to examine the  progress and challenges to achieving greater diversity in the legal profession. Aiming to create an ‘agenda for change’ for both national and international levels, the summit developed future strategies to ensure that more senior women advance to leadership positions, reflecting the talent pool entering the profession and providing firms with ways to stop the haemorrhaging of talent.

The summit legacy report harnesses the findings of the global pre-summit survey commissioned specially for the summit and the outcomes of the summit’s plenary and breakout session to pinpoint the key steps that both professional bodies and legal practices should be taking to make a tangible difference to current progress.

The launch is being jointly organised by the Law Society and the Interlaw Diversity Forum in view of the high degree of alignment between the outcomes of the Summit and the findings of the Career Progression Report 2012 published by the Interlaw Diversity Forum and the mutually supportive recommendations.

Several distinguished speakers including the Minister for Women & Equalities, Helen Grant and BP general counsel Rupert Bondy will discuss the future of women lawyers, how practices can think, act and report on the barriers facing women, and whether there is a place for women in the boardroom. The full line up of speakers includes:
Lucy Scott-Moncrieff, president, the Law Society, Helen Grant, Minister for Women & Equalities (Ministry of Justice) Daniel Winterfeldt, chair, Interlaw Diversity Forum Rupert Bondy, general counsel, BP plc Nicola Mumford, director, Wragge and Co.

Please come and join us to celebrate the next step in delivering a new agenda intended to drive and signpost further change and progress within the legal profession.

To register your place, please visit 

http://services.lawsociety.org.uk/events/node/58560

and complete and online booking form.

Sponsored by

This year we are supporting the Terrence Higgins Trust in the run-up to World Aids Day on 1 December. 

Think about whether you can help by selling red ribbons from THT in your workplace or selling InterLaw Diversity Forum raffle entries. We’re offering three pairs of free tickets to the Winter Carnival for the lucky winners, including two pairs of Platinum Tickets (which include a canapes reception and dinner) valued at £300 a pair and two pairs of Gold Tickets (which include welcome cocktail and canapes reception).

InterLaw Diversity Forum Raffle entries are available by making a £10 donation through our JustGiving page here. 

Please promote this fundraising effort to your friends and colleagues. Winners will be drawn at the December InterLaw Christmas Drinks kindly hosted by Eversheds. Who doesn’t want to win a fabulous night out at the Club at the Ivy with Tony- and Olivier-award-winning Gandalf? Sorry, we mean Sir Ian McKellen CH, CBE.

To sell THT ribbons in your workplace, just visit the THT website here where there are loads of fundraising ideas and support. 

Join us at 6.30 pm on Wednesday 17 October for an update and discussion on LGBT workplace equality. This is an important issue which touches upon all our careers, so don’t miss out on the latest legal and best practice updates for your firms. RSVP here. 

We have lined up as speakers:

   Arpita Dutt, Partner, Stewarts Law;

    David Fenton, Partner, Statham Gill Davies;

    Alex Van Vliet, Workplace Programs, Stonewall; 

    LGBT Network, Hogan Lovells.

Arpita and David will be looking at recent case law and trends in litigation and we will also be hearing from Stonewall and Hogan Lovells, whose LGBT Network is running some really great initiatives and we hope they inspire all of to improve our network. The meeting will be followed by networking drinks as usual.

The event is kindly hosted by Stewarts Law at 5 New Street Square, London, EC4A 3BF. As always, if you are unable to join us for the meeting at 6:30 pm, please join us from approximately 7:30 pm for network drinks.