Diversity and Inclusion

Cabinet Office is committed to a policy of equal opportunity for all staff. We will not discriminate on grounds of gender, gender identity, race, disability, sexual orientation, religion or belief, age, those with caring responsibilities, part time workers or any other factor irrelevant to a person’s work.

We encourage a diverse workforce and aim to provide a working environment where all staff at all levels are valued and respected, and where discrimination, bullying, promotion of negative stereotyping and harassment are not tolerated.

Assessment for recruitment, selection, appraisal, training and career progression purposes is based both on the individual’s ability and suitability for the work.

We are committed to providing all staff with opportunities to maximise their skills and achieve their potential, offering flexible working arrangements wherever possible. As a public body, we have statutory duties placed on us that require us to promote equality of opportunity and eliminate unlawful discrimination. We expect all staff to assist the department in meeting these obligations. All staff should have due regard for the need to promote good relations between individuals from different groups and work towards achieving equality of opportunity for all.

Belonging

The Civil Service is committed to becoming the most inclusive employer in the UK. We are committed to understanding, respecting and representing as broad a range of views and backgrounds as we have in UK society. We know that diverse perspectives and experiences are critical to an effective, modern Civil Service.

Our vision is to ensure the Civil Service represents modern Britain and is a truly inclusive employer – an example to other employers. We will create an organisation where diversity is not only respected and valued – but celebrated.

It is important to us that we represent the society we serve. We want to have a diverse workforce and an inclusive working environment. To make it happen, we:

• measure and improve diversity at GDS
• create an inclusive working environment through our networks
• embed inclusivity at all levels of GDS, including leadership
• ensure diversity and representation at all levels

Equal opportunities

We are an equal opportunity employer and value diversity at our company. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, colour, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status or disability status.

Equity

Respect, collaboration and trust are at the core of our culture. We trust each other to do our best work. We believe in our mission and work for the whole population. We can only do that by being an equitable organisation ourselves.

We believe that diverse teams are better. We are trying to make sure that everyone has a fair and equitable experience of being on the team and progressing in the team.

We’ll consider all applicants who meet the criteria for employment, without regard to race, colour, religion, class, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, genetics, disability or age.

Creating an inclusive environment

We have a strong group of networks operating across the organisation, nearly all of which are sponsored by a senior leader.

These networks include:

Our networks challenge everyone in the organisation to think about how we can be more inclusive in every aspect of our work.

Our Initiatives

We aim to make our interview process as inclusive for all candidates. Please see below some of the initiatives that we have in place:

• as a disability confident employer, we have committed to interviewing all candidates who identify as disabled and meet the minimum requirement for one of our roles under our Guaranteed Interview Scheme (GIS)
• inclusive interview panels - we aim to reflect the society we serve. One of the ways we do this is to ensure our interview panels are gender inclusive as well as minority race and ethnicity inclusive
• all our vacancies at GDS are apart of Great Place to Work for Veterans initiative, which looks to achieve its ambition of making the United Kingdom the best place to be a veteran anywhere in the world