Public sector equality duty in schools

The general duty: section 149 and its three needs

Section 149 of the Equality Act 2010 is the public sector equality duty (PSED), and it binds every public authority, including a maintained school's governing body and an academy trust, whenever it exercises its functions. Subsection (1) of section 149 of the Equality Act 2010 reads: “A public authority must, in the exercise of its functions, have due regard to the need to– (a) eliminate discrimination, harassment, victimisation and any other conduct that is prohibited by or under this Act; (b) advance equality of opportunity between persons who share a relevant protected characteristic and persons who do not share it; (c) foster good relations between persons who share a relevant protected characteristic and persons who do not share it.”

Those are the three needs (the government's guidance calls them the three aims), and together they are known as the general duty. Two later subsections say what the second and third involve:

• Advancing equality of opportunity (section 149(3)) involves having due regard, in particular, to the need to “remove or minimise disadvantages suffered by persons who share a relevant protected characteristic that are connected to that characteristic”, to “take steps to meet the needs of persons who share a relevant protected characteristic that are different from the needs of persons who do not share it”, and to “encourage persons who share a relevant protected characteristic to participate in public life or in any other activity in which participation by such persons is disproportionately low”.
• Fostering good relations (section 149(5)) involves having due regard, in particular, to the need to “(a) tackle prejudice, and (b) promote understanding.”

Eight characteristics, not nine. The Equality Act 2010 has nine protected characteristics, but section 149(7) lists only eight as relevant to the equality duty: “age; disability; gender reassignment; pregnancy and maternity; race; religion or belief; sex; sexual orientation.” Marriage and civil partnership is not among them, but it does not drop out altogether. The Government Equalities Office's guidance explains: “Marriage and civil partnership is a protected characteristic but not a ‘relevant’ one. This means you have to consider it only in relation to the first aim of the duty. Discrimination because of marriage and civil partnership is only prohibited in relation to the work provisions of the act.” For a school, that means it counts, under the first need, in its decisions as an employer. The Act's characteristics are sex and gender reassignment; “gender” is not one of them. Keeping children safe in education 2026 paragraph 102 says the duty “applies to all protected characteristics”; the statute is narrower, and a school's policy should take its list from section 149(7), with marriage and civil partnership for the first need only.

Age and pupils. In schools age drops out too, for pupils. Paragraph 1 of Schedule 18 to the Equality Act 2010 says: “Section 149, so far as relating to age, does not apply to the exercise of a function relating to– (a) the provision of education to pupils in schools; (b) the provision of benefits, facilities or services to pupils in schools”. So age stays relevant to the school as an employer and in functions that do not relate to pupils, such as letting its premises to the community, but not to its teaching of pupils or the services it provides to them. The Department for Education's advice The Equality Act 2010 and schools (paragraph 5.2) puts the main case: age “will be a relevant characteristic in considering their duties in their role as an employer but not in relation to pupils.”

A duty of process, not outcome. The Government Equalities Office's Public Sector Equality Duty: guidance for public authorities (December 2023) explains: “‘Having due regard’ means properly considering the 3 aims identified in the act, and how they relate to the function you are exercising, and then deciding what weight to give them. It is not a duty to achieve a particular outcome.” A summary that says the PSED requires schools to “actively promote equality” or to “eliminate discrimination” overstates it: the duty is to give proper, timely consideration to the need to do those things, alongside everything else the decision involves.

Who the duty applies to: maintained schools, academies and trusts

The public sector equality duty applies to the bodies listed in Schedule 19 to the Equality Act 2010. For schools in England, Part 1 lists:

• “The governing body of an educational establishment maintained by an English local authority”: the governing body of each maintained school, including a maintained nursery school.
• “The proprietor of a City Technology College, a City College for Technology of the Arts, or an Academy”: for an academy or free school, the proprietor is the academy trust, so in a multi-academy trust the duty sits with the trust board, not with each school.
• “A local authority with respect to the pupil referral units it establishes and maintains”: for a pupil referral unit, the duty is the local authority's.

Independent schools. An independent school that is not an academy is not a listed public authority. Section 149(2) still applies to anyone who “is not a public authority but who exercises public functions”, for those functions only, so an independent school is bound in that limited sense, if at all. The rest of the Equality Act still applies to it: section 85 of the Equality Act 2010, in Part 6, makes it unlawful for the responsible body of a school, an independent school's proprietor included, to discriminate against, harass or victimise pupils and applicants, and the DfE's advice (paragraph 1.4) says that in England and Wales “the Act applies to all maintained and independent schools”.

Who in the school. The listed body is the governing body or trust, and the GEO guidance is blunt about where the duty sits: “The duty cannot be delegated and it is on the decision-maker personally.” The DfE's advice says: “Schools can't delegate responsibility for carrying out the duty to anyone else.” A headteacher deciding under delegated powers, or a local governing body in a trust, still has to have due regard when it decides; what cannot be handed over is the responsibility for the duty being met.

Keeping children safe in education 2026, paragraphs 101 to 103, places the duty within safeguarding. Paragraph 101 says: “The Public Sector Equality Duty (PSED) is found in the Equality Act. Compliance with the PSED is a legal requirement for state-funded schools and colleges.” Footnote 24, to paragraph 88, puts the same point another way: “The Public Sector Equality Duty is a legal requirement for schools and colleges that are public bodies.” Paragraph 102 adds that “whenever significant decisions are being made or policies developed, specific consideration must be given to the equality implications of these such as, for example, the need to eliminate unlawful behaviours that relate to them, such as sexual violence and sexual harassment, misogyny/misandry, racism and faith-based prejudice. This is one reason why good record-keeping and monitoring of all forms of abuse and harassment is essential.” The recording racist incidents guide covers that incident record, and the statutory policies guide sets the equality publication among the other documents a school must hold.

Where it applies. Section 149 extends to England, Wales and Scotland; it does not extend to Northern Ireland. The general duty is the same across Great Britain, but the specific duties, what must be published and when, are set separately for England, Wales and Scotland, and the rest of this guide follows England's until the note on Wales and Scotland in section 05.

What schools must publish: the specific duties in England

In England the specific duties are in the Equality Act 2010 (Specific Duties and Public Authorities) Regulations 2017 (SI 2017/353), in force since 31 March 2017, and Schedule 2 to those regulations lists the same school bodies as the Act. There are two duties for every school, and two more that depend on headcount.

1. Equality information, at least every year. Regulation 4(1): each listed authority “must publish information to demonstrate its compliance with the duty imposed by section 149(1) of the Act”, and under regulation 4(2) “subsequently at intervals of not greater than one year beginning with the date of last publication.” Regulation 4(3) says the information must include, in particular, information relating to people who share a relevant protected characteristic who are “(a) its employees; (b) other persons affected by its policies and practices.” For a school, the second group is chiefly its pupils, and also parents and others who use its services.
2. Equality objectives, at least every four years. Regulation 5 of the 2017 Regulations requires “one or more objectives it thinks it should achieve to do any of the things mentioned in paragraphs (a) to (c) of section 149(1)”, published “at intervals of not greater than four years beginning with the date of last publication”, and “An objective published by a public authority in compliance with paragraph (1) must be specific and measurable.”
3. Employee information, at 150 or more employees. Regulation 4(4): “Paragraph (3)(a) does not apply to a public authority with fewer than 150 employees.” Below 150, the school publishes information about people affected by its policies and practices, but not about its staff.
4. Gender pay gap data, at 250 or more employees. Schedule 1 to the 2017 Regulations applies to a listed authority “which has 250 or more employees on the snapshot date”, which is 31 March. The authority publishes its mean and median gender pay gaps, its bonus gaps, the proportions of men and women receiving a bonus and the proportions in each pay quartile “within the period of 12 months beginning with the snapshot date”.

Whose headcount counts. For a maintained school, regulation 2(3) of the 2017 Regulations says that “an employee of an English local authority at a maintained school is to be treated as an employee of the governing body of that school”, so the 150 and 250 thresholds are counted for the school itself, and most maintained schools fall below both. For an academy the listed body is the proprietor, the academy trust, so the headcount is the whole trust's. A multi-academy trust with 150 or more staff must publish employee information, and one with 250 or more must publish gender pay gap data, even when every one of its schools is small.

Where and how. Regulation 6 requires publication “in a manner that is accessible to the public”, and adds: “A public authority may comply with the requirements to publish information in regulation 4 or 5 by publishing the information within another published document.” The DfE's advice (paragraph 5.25) suggests that “For most schools, the simplest approach may be to set up an equalities page on their website where all this information is present or links to it are available.” A trust is the listed body and may publish once for all its schools, but the DfE's guidance What academies, free schools and colleges should publish online says that academies “must publish” details of how they comply with the duty, “updating this every year”, and their equality objectives, “updating these at least every 4 years”, so each academy's own website needs to carry them.

What is not required. No law requires a school to publish an equality impact assessment, an equality scheme or an equality action plan. The GEO guidance lists “I must publish an equality impact assessment” as a myth: “there is no requirement to publish these assessments.” The DfE's advice (paragraph 5.6) says: “There is no legal requirement to produce a formal equality impact assessment document, although for key decisions this might be a helpful tool.” Nor does the law in England require an objective for every characteristic, or new objectives every year.

A note on the DfE advice. The DfE's schools advice, The Equality Act 2010 and schools, dates from May 2014 and still cites the Equality Act 2010 (Specific Duties) Regulations 2011. Those were revoked in 2017; the explanatory note to the 2017 Regulations says that “The requirements in regulations 4 to 6 reproduce requirements in the Equality Act 2010 (Specific Duties) Regulations 2011”, so the advice's account of the duties is still right in substance. Cite the 2017 Regulations in your own documents.

Equality information and equality objectives: what good looks like

Equality information. The point of the annual publication is to show that the school has had due regard, so it describes what the school knows about the people its decisions affect and what it has done. The DfE's advice (paragraph 5.13) notes that, below 150 employees, “for the great majority of schools, only pupil-related data will need to be published.” Paragraph 5.15 says the information “does not necessarily have to be statistical data. Many other kinds of information can be used to show how the school is promoting equality, such as publishing its policies online, or publishing minutes of Governors' meetings”. Useful content usually includes:

• the make-up of the pupil population by the characteristics the school holds data on, such as sex, ethnicity, special educational needs and disability, and religion where it is recorded;
• gaps the school has found in attainment, progress, attendance, exclusions or participation between groups, and what it is doing about them;
• the reasonable adjustments and accessibility work the school has done, with a link to its accessibility plan;
• how incidents of prejudice-related bullying and harassment are recorded and analysed, in summary only;
• the decisions and policy reviews in the year where equality was considered, and what changed as a result.

Small numbers and data protection. The DfE's advice says: “Broadly speaking, schools must ensure that individuals are not able to be identified through the publication of data. The Department for Education does not generally publish information which relates to fewer than 3 people (school staff or pupils)”. In a small school, a single figure for pupils of one ethnicity or with one disability can identify a child, so publish ranges, combined groups or a narrative instead; the special category data guide explains why health, ethnicity and religion need particular care.

Equality objectives. Regulation 5 asks for one or more objectives that are specific and measurable. The DfE's advice (paragraph 5.26) says: “Objectives are not intended to be burdensome or a ‘tick box’ exercise, but they do need to be specific and measurable.” The GEO guidance warns: “Try not to rely on basic, internal goals like diversity training instead of ambitious, customer-facing goals like closing the educational disadvantage gap in schools”. A good objective names a group, a measure, a starting point, a target and a date, and it follows from the information the school has published. The GEO guidance also says: “You can set your own deadlines as long as you never go more than 4 years without publishing a new objective.”

The example is invented to show the shape; the content must come from your own school's data and decisions. A local authority, diocese or trust may publish a model statement to adapt.

Due regard in a school decision, the record that shows it, and Wales and Scotland

When. Due regard comes before the decision, not after it. The GEO guidance says: “Your assessment must be before and at the time a particular decision is being considered, and not after the decision has been made.” The DfE's advice says: “Schools should consider equality implications before and at the time that they develop policy and take decisions, not as an afterthought, and they need to keep them under review on a continuing basis.”

How much. The regard has to be proportionate to the decision. The DfE's advice (paragraph 5.5) gives the school example: “a decision to change the time of school assembly is unlikely to have a significant impact on any particular group. On the other hand, deciding when and where to have a school trip may raise a range of considerations”, and it names them: “are the facilities for boys and girls equivalent; are they accessible to disabled pupils; does the date cut across any religious holidays and so exclude some pupils”. The transport, and the arrangements for a disabled pupil's medical needs, are equality questions too. So are a change to uniform, a new admissions or behaviour policy, a restructure of support staff, the closure of a breakfast club and the response to a pattern of incidents in one year group.

The record. The law does not require a written record of due regard, but without one a school will struggle to show it. The DfE's advice (paragraph 5.6) says: “It is good practice for schools to keep a written record to show that they have actively considered their equality duties and asked themselves relevant questions.” Paragraph 5.7 adds that if a school does not record its consideration “this does not automatically mean that the duty to have ‘due regard’ has not been met. However, if challenged, it will be easier for a school to demonstrate that the duty has been met if a record has been made at the time.” The GEO guidance says the same, and says where that record may end up:

• “In a judicial review challenging non-compliance with the duty, the decision-maker would be expected to demonstrate compliance. The easiest way to demonstrate compliance is using written records from the time of the decision.”
• “You do not have to refer to the duty in your records. You do not have to make a new record if you can preserve the same information by, for example, saving an existing email or minute. However, referring to the duty in your records may help you to prove compliance.”
• “You may have to disclose your records in the context of litigation like a judicial review or in response to a Freedom of Information request.”

In practice the record is a paragraph in the governors' minutes, a section of the report that went to the board, a short equality note attached to a policy review, or the email in which the headteacher weighed up the trip date. What matters is that it was written at the time and can be found later. As the GEO guidance says, a Freedom of Information request can reach it; the FOI for schools guide covers how a school answers one, and the contemporaneous notes guide covers what makes a note made at the time worth more than one written up afterwards.

Wales. Governing bodies of maintained schools in Wales are listed in Part 2 of Schedule 19, and their specific duties are in the Equality Act 2010 (Statutory Duties) (Wales) Regulations 2011. They differ from England's: an authority “must publish objectives that are designed to enable it to better perform the general duty”; “If an authority does not publish an equality objective in respect of one or more of the protected characteristics it must publish reasons for its decision not to do so”; each objective must be reviewed within four years of first publication and at least every four years after that; and every authority must make a Strategic Equality Plan.

Scotland. In Scotland the Schedule to the Equality Act 2010 (Specific Duties) (Scotland) Regulations 2012 lists, as separate bodies, the education authority, the council, for the schools it manages, and the managers of each grant-aided school. Under regulation 4 of the Equality Act 2010 (Specific Duties) (Scotland) Regulations 2012, a listed authority publishes a set of equality outcomes “at intervals of not more than 4 years” and a report on progress towards them “at intervals of not more than 2 years”. For a council school, the duty to publish sits with the council, not with the school.

Where the equality decisions are actually discussed

The equality statement is written once a year. The decisions it describes are made all year, and many of them are argued out before anyone writes a minute. The trip date is settled in the year-team group chat after a teacher points out it falls on Eid. The headteacher and the SENCO agree by message on a Sunday how a pupil's adjustment will work on sports day. A parent texts the class teacher to ask whether the new uniform policy allows her daughter's headscarf, and the teacher passes it on. The response to three incidents in Year 9 is worked out by the pastoral team in a thread on their phones.

Those messages are often the best evidence the school has that it considered equality before and at the time it decided. The GEO guidance says an existing email or minute can serve as the record, and that the record may have to be disclosed in a judicial review or in answer to a Freedom of Information request. A thread on a teacher's personal phone is a record the school cannot search, cannot keep for as long as the decision might be challenged and cannot produce when it is asked, and the teacher may have left by then.

ComplyChat is designed to keep those conversations where the school can find them. Staff, and parents added by their mobile number, talk in channels the school controls; a mobile number verified by SMS is an identity, so a parent does not need an account on the school's systems; and everyone added to a channel is told it is on the record and can object or leave. Messages are recorded on the server as they are sent, not gathered from handsets afterwards, and on paid plans, once the school's tenant is connected, conversations are kept under the retention schedules within its own Microsoft 365 subscription. ComplyChat does not write the equality statement, set objectives, analyse pupil data or replace the governors' minutes: the considered record of a significant decision still belongs in the minute or the report.

A question for the next governing board meeting: for the last three significant decisions the school or trust made, where is the record, made at the time, that shows equality was considered, and could you produce it if a parent asked?

Questions people ask

What are the three needs of the public sector equality duty?

Section 149(1) of the Equality Act 2010 requires a public authority, including a maintained school's governing body or an academy trust, to have due regard to the need to eliminate discrimination, harassment and victimisation, to advance equality of opportunity between people who share a relevant protected characteristic and people who do not, and to foster good relations between them. The government's guidance calls them the three aims.

Does the Equality Act apply to schools?

Yes. Part 6 of the Equality Act 2010, on discrimination against pupils and applicants, applies to every school, including independent schools, and Keeping children safe in education 2026 paragraph 101 says that compliance with the public sector equality duty “is a legal requirement for state-funded schools and colleges”. Independent schools that are not academies are not listed public authorities in Schedule 19 to the Act, so they are outside the equality duty except for any public function they exercise.

What data is required to be published under the public sector equality duty?

Schools in England must publish information, at least every year, showing how they comply with section 149(1), including information about people with protected characteristics affected by their policies and practices, and about their employees only if they have 150 or more employees (regulation 4 of the 2017 Regulations). They must also publish one or more specific and measurable equality objectives at least every four years (regulation 5). For an academy, the 150-employee test and the 250-employee test for gender pay gap data apply to the whole trust.

What are the requirements of section 149 public sector equality duty?

Section 149 requires due regard to the three needs whenever a public authority exercises its functions; it does not require a particular outcome or a formal equality impact assessment. The Government Equalities Office's guidance says the regard must be had “before and at the time” of the decision, and that the easiest way to show it is with “written records from the time of the decision”.

What are the 9 protected characteristics?

The Equality Act 2010's nine protected characteristics are age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, sex and sexual orientation, but section 149(7) lists eight “relevant” ones for the equality duty. Marriage and civil partnership is left out of the second and third needs but still counts for the first, eliminating discrimination, which for that characteristic is prohibited only at work, so for a school it matters as an employer. In schools, Schedule 18 also takes age out of the duty for functions relating to education and to benefits, facilities and services for pupils, so age remains relevant to the school as an employer and in functions that do not relate to pupils, but not to its teaching of pupils or the services it provides to them.

Does the public sector equality duty apply to independent schools?

Not as a listed authority: Schedule 19 to the Equality Act 2010 lists the governing bodies of maintained schools and the proprietors of academies, not independent schools. Section 149(2) still binds a body that is not a public authority when it exercises public functions, and the rest of the Act, including section 85 in Part 6 on schools, applies to independent schools.

Official guidance and your next step

The law is in section 149, Schedule 18 and Schedule 19 of the Equality Act 2010 and, for England, the Specific Duties and Public Authorities Regulations 2017; Wales and Scotland have the 2011 Welsh regulations and the 2012 Scottish regulations. The Government Equalities Office's Public Sector Equality Duty: guidance for public authorities is the plainest current explanation. For schools, the Department for Education's The Equality Act 2010 and schools (May 2014, still current, though it cites the revoked 2011 Regulations) covers the duty in chapter 5, What academies, free schools and colleges should publish online sets out what an academy's website must carry, and paragraphs 88, 92 and 101 to 103 of Keeping children safe in education 2026 place it within safeguarding. KCSIE paragraph 103 also points to the Equality and Human Rights Commission's Technical Guidance on the Public Sector Equality Duty: England. Quotations are from those pages as published on 1 November 2026.

This guide covers schools and academy trusts in England, with notes on Wales and Scotland, and is not legal advice about a particular decision or challenge.

Then do one thing: open your school's or trust's equalities page and check two dates – when the equality information was last published, which should be within the last twelve months, and when the objectives were last published, which should be within the last four years. If either has passed, that is the first job for the next governing board agenda.