Consultation and feedback

Medway Council, along with all other public bodies in the country, has a formal duty to promote equality between men and women and make sure that customers are not discriminated against on the grounds of their sex.

As part of this duty, the council must produce a gender equality scheme, including an action plan on the key improvements it wants to make to ensure gender equality.

The council has looked at its own local information about services, including whether men and women have expressed different views in responding to previous Citizens’ Panel exercises. It has also looked at national research which shows where people may be discriminated against because of their sex.

The council is committed to putting all customers at the heart of everything it does. On a positive note, its analysis shows that, in Medway, there are not many examples of discrimination. There are some areas, though, where women have reported lower levels of satisfaction with services than men and some services that are not delivering the same results for men and women. In these cases, the council wants to take action.

Key actions to promote equality

The council has produced a draft scheme that includes the following key actions:

• reduce the educational attainment gap between girls and boys, as girls out-perform boys in many areas;
• improve women’s feelings of safety in Medway, as women feel less safe;
• improve targeted information for carers - the council wants to improve the service for all carers but there are more women than men with caring responsibilities in Medway;
• plan housing to meet the needs of victims of domestic violence - although not exclusively women, victims of domestic violence are more likely to be women;
• improve the council's monitoring and gathering of user feedback to make sure it identifies and takes action on any areas where satisfaction levels or outcomes differ for men and women.

Seeking your views

Before the council finalised the scheme, it sought the views of the people of Medway. Using a short questionnaire, which was available on this website, it asked them to select, from the list of key actions it had identified, which three they thought are the most important. It also asked them to say what other problems they think the council should be tackling through the scheme.

People had until 24 April 2007 to respond and the council thanks everyone who took the time to help it improve the services it provides.

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