The Law Society of New South Wales (NSW) has released a guide to assist NSW law firms to identify and eliminate discrimination and harassment, both in employment practices in the workplace and during the recruitment process. The guide includes a checklist-style approach to decision-making and implementation procedure. Helping firms to ensure they are meeting best practice standards, as well as model discrimination and harassment policies, which firms can adopt, including:
- Model Equal Opportunity Policy
- Model Anti-Harassment Policy
- Model Grievance Handling Procedure.
President of the NSW Law Society, Juliana Warner said: “This Guide and accompanying Model Policies are intended to identify practitioners’ current legal obligations under antidiscrimination law and provide practical tools for NSW law firms and legal practices to identify and eliminate discrimination and harassment in recruitment and employment practices. It forms part of the Law Society’s ongoing work to assist law firms and legal practices create more diverse and inclusive legal workplaces where everyone feels safe, secure and supported. Since the Law Society first developed an Equal Opportunity Policy in 1996, we have demonstrated a firm and ongoing commitment to the principles and practice of fairness of opportunity and diversity in the legal profession.”
Read more about the guide here.