Pregnancy and maternity discrimination: UK employment law

Essential points

• The main legislation governing pregnancy and maternity discrimination in the UK is the Equality Act 2010 (note that Northern Ireland has its own equality laws).
• Pregnancy and maternity discrimination occurs when someone is discriminated against contrary to the Equality Act 2010 due to their pregnancy or maternity absence, whilst they are breast feeding and for reasons related to pregnancy and maternity.
• There is no definition of pregnancy or maternity itself but the Equality Act extends the discrimination protection so that it goes beyond the pregnancy itself. The protection extends to include unfavourable treatment during what is known as the 'protected period' (whilst a woman is pregnant and exercising maternity leave rights) and covers treatment linked to these events.
• The forms of discrimination which the Equality Act renders unlawful for pregnancy and maternity are:
  • Direct discrimination: treating  a woman unfavourably linked to pregnancy, maternity or her protected period;
  • associative and perceived discrimination is also included within the scope of protection; and
  • victimisation.
• Although indirect discrimination and harassment do not explicitly apply to circumstances linked to pregnancy and maternity, in reality, disadvantageous treatment or harassment in such circumstances amounts to sex discrimination and harassment related to sex.
• The legislation provides rights to, and special protection for, time off (for ante-natal appointments), health and safety, pregnancy related illness, maternity leave and redundancy/redeployment as well as breast-feeding. These aspects are additional to discrimination protection and are not considered within this section; more details can be found on our Maternity leave and pay law page and also in Acas guidance on redundancy protection.