Ministerial departments

It seems it’s too much to ask government departments to get it right.

There are 23 ministerial departments listed on gov.uk. At the time of writing (October 2020), 17 of them were advertising vacancies.

Many use the same recruitment system, but several are different.

All of them ask for the ‘gender’ of the applicant; not one asks for their sex.

Some use the terms female and male, even though those the are the correct terms for sex, but others use man and women, presumably because someone thought those were gender terms and even though they are defined in the Equality Act 2010 in relation to the protected characteristic of sex.

Others use the term ‘non-binary’ but provide no definition of it; some allow the applicant to ‘self-describe’ their ‘gender’.

None mention the Equality Act 2010 to explain why they are gathering this information. None of them list the protected characteristics or inform the applicant of their rights under the Equality Act.

Click on the department name or scroll down. Click on each screenshot to enlarge.

The following departments were not advertising job vacancies at the time of compilation (October 2020):

Prime Minister's Office, 10 Downing Street
Attorney General's Office
Office of the Advocate General for Scotland
Office of the Leader of the House of Commons
Office of the Leader of the House of Lords
Office of the Secretary of State for Scotland
Office of the Secretary of State for Wales Swyddfa Ysgrifennydd Gwladol Cymru

Cabinet Office

@cabinetofficeuk

Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy

@beisgovuk

Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport

@DCMS

Department for Education

@educationgovuk

Department for Environment Food & Rural Affairs

@defragovuk

Department for International Trade 

@tradegovuk

Department for Transport

@transportgovuk

Department for Work & Pensions 

@dwp

Department of Health & Social Care

@dhscgovuk

Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office 

@fcdogovuk

HM Treasury 

@hmtreasury

Home Office 

@ukhomeoffice

Ministry of Defence 

@defencehq

Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government 

@mhclg

Ministry of Justice

@mojgovuk

Northern Ireland Office 

@NIOgov

UK Export Finance 

@UKEF