Equality Diversity and Inclusion
Equality Diversity and Inclusion ©

British Council

The British Council is the United Kingdom’s international organisation for cultural relations and educational opportunities.

Working effectively with equality, diversity and inclusion is an essential part of our purpose. We want to ensure that everyone who works with us and for us is treated with respect and dignity. We will not unlawfully discriminate including on grounds of age, disability including HIV/AIDS status, sex and gender including transgender and intersex, pregnancy or maternity, marital status including civil partnership, political opinion, race/ethnicity and culture, religion and belief including protected beliefs, sexual orientation, socio-economic background, spent convictions, trade union activity or membership, having or not having dependants or work pattern.

The British Council is committed to:

  • policies, strategies, and procedures that encourage behaviour which promotes equality, values diversity and contributes to an inclusive organisational culture, including in recruitment, selection, performance management and in the delivery of our programmes and services
  • undertaking equality screening and impact assessments of policies and activities which impact on employees and/or external contacts or the wider community
  • treating individuals with fairness, dignity and respect, recognising and supporting human rights
  • making every effort to remove barriers and redress imbalances caused by inequality and unjustified discrimination.
  • We require all staff to ensure their behaviour is consistent with this policy. We also require that clients, customers, partners and suppliers are made aware of this policy and operate within it.

We will provide adequate and appropriate resources to implement this global policy statement and will ensure it is communicated and understood.

The British Council will review this global policy statement annually to reflect new legal and regulatory developments and promote good practice.  

This global policy statement was approved by Scott McDonald, Chief Executive, in April 2025 and is due for review in March 2026

What do we mean by equality and diversity?

Equality

Equality of opportunity is about treating people fairly and without bias and about creating conditions in the workplace and wider society that encourage and value diversity and promote dignity. It is also about trying to redress past imbalances and ensuring that dealings with clients, customers and suppliers are conducted in a constructive way that supports appropriate inclusion and does not give rise to unjustified discrimination.

Diversity

Diversity is concerned with creating an inclusive environment and practices which benefit the organisation and those who work in and with it. It takes account of the fact that people differ from one another in many ways. Understanding, valuing and effectively managing these differences can result in greater participation that can be leveraged for success at an individual, team and organisational level.When we talk about equal opportunity and diversity, we focus on seven main areas:

  • Age
  • Disability
  • Race/ethnicity
  • Gender (which includes transgender)
  • Religion/belief and culture
  • Sexual orientation
  • Work-life balance

Our approach to equal opportunity and diversity

We have developed a number of policies to promote equality and diversity and we use a range of tools to monitor and evaluate our progress in mainstreaming these. We believe the best way to manage equal opportunity and diversity is to ensure that they are built into all processes and functions, considered part of all policy decisions, and present in the planning of all programmes from start to finish. This is what we mean by mainstreaming equality and diversity principles and practices.

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