34. The services are improving their programmes for the employment and development of ethnic minority staff and are making sure that ethnic minority staff are not restricted to a limited range of jobs, or placed under unreasonable pressures by reason of their colour. They should, moreover, be employed where possible in positions where they are publicly visible and are able by their presence to reassure the ethnic minority communities that the service to which they belong is one in which they can have confidence. It is also important to make sure that people from the ethnic minorities are receiving their fair share of the services that are being provided to the public, that they are receiving the same quality of service as other people, and that they are showing the same level of satisfaction. Effective monitoring and information systems are needed in matters both of employment and of service delivery. They are difficult to construct but they are gradually being developed and put in place in each of the services concerned. The Government is fully committed to promoting and supporting these developments.
Other measures against racial discrimination
35. The Race Relations Act 1976, which applies to the whole of Great Britain but not to Northern Ireland, where the problems are of a different kind, is generally working well, but the Government remains ready to fill any gaps where it thinks this is necessary and where the opportunity arises. The Act has been amended by the Housing and Planning Act 1986 to make it unlawful for a planning authority to discriminate against a person in carrying out its planning functions. By virtue of the Housing Act 1988, the Commission for Racial Equality now has the power, subject to the approval of Parliament, to issue codes of practice containing such guidance as its thinks fit for the elimination of discrimination in the field of rented housing and for the promotion of equality of opportunity in the field of rented housing between persons of different racial groups. The Housing Act 1988 also imposes a duty on the Housing Corporation and Housing Action Trusts to make appropriate arrangements with a view to ensuring that their various functions are carried out with due regard to eliminating unlawful racial discrimination and to promoting equality of opportunity, and good relations, between persons of different racial groups.
36.
The Education Reform Act 1988 will extend throughout the education sector and will ensure that grant-maintained schools will still have a duty to promote equal opportunities and be eligible for grants under section 11 of the Local Government Act 1966 to help meet the special needs of members of ethnic minorities. The law on incitement to racial hatred has also been strengthened; this is described in connection with the relevant articles of the Covenant.
Political and religious discrimination
37. Discrimination on grounds of political or religious belief has not been a significant problem in Great Britain for many years. An exceptional situation prevails in Northern Ireland, as described in paragraphs 47 to 50 below. Some religions, such as Judaism or Sikhism, are protected by the Race Relations Act 1976, since both Jews and Sikhs are regarded as racial groups. Various statutory disabilities have in the past been imposed upon Jews and Roman Catholics. For the most part, these were gradually removed during the course of the last century, although it was only during the present administration's term that the bar to a Roman Catholic holding the office of