Our approach

In Shropshire, the tool that we use to do this work is referred to as an Equality, Social Inclusion and Health Impact Assessment (ESHIA).

This is a single screening template, usually presented as an appendix to a committee report, either to cabinet or to the Strategic Licensing Committee. The ESHIAs thus form part of the committee paper documentation for elected members to consider in decision making processes: and are a crucial component within such considerations as well as a visible and demonstration of our approach.

Our ESHIA screening sets out to ensure that “due regard” is being given to equality, equity, social inclusion and health and wellbeing.

For us, this is about maximising the opportunity of a legal requirement in relation to considering impacts for the nine protected characteristic groupings to augment it with our own extra efforts as a council.

These are in relation to health and well being, linked to health impact considerations; to environmental impacts, linked to climate change considerations; and to economic impacts.

None of these are legal requirements under the Equality Act 2010, albeit that may change in relation to economic impacts should there be legislation brought forward in that regard.

Together, they add value or at least ensure that the council is visibly seeking to take an holistic view of impacts: and as importantly for our service areas is taking a proportionate and time efficient way in which to do so through use of a single template.

Our ESHIA screening thus sets out to ensure that “due regard” is being given to equality, equity, social inclusion and health and well being, in line with our local aspirations as set out in the Shropshire Plan as well as with our national legal obligations.

Since 2014, our own equality impact screening assessment has encompassed consideration of social inclusion, including consideration of rurality impacts.

Social inclusion is the wider additional category we use in Shropshire, in order to help us to go beyond the equality legislation in also considering impacts for individuals and households with regard to the circumstances in which they may find themselves across their life stages. This could be households on low incomes, or households facing challenges in accessing services, such as households in rural areas, and veterans and serving members of the armed forces and their families, or people that we might consider to be vulnerable, such as young people leaving care or refugee families.

Rurality is not in itself a protected characteristic as set out in the Equality Act 2010. Rurality may usefully be considered in regard to the circumstances in which people find themselves as individuals or as households, including issues such as fuel poverty, lack of access to services and facilities, and lack of opportunities for training and employment.

Please note that the armed forces are now a grouping to whom we are required to give due regard under new Armed Forces legislation, although in practice we have been doing so for a number of years now.