IEA Director of Public Policy and Communications Matthew Lesh has written for The Times criticising the Labour Party’s plans to introduce new legislation to close ethnic pay gaps, which would include reporting mandates for large companies.

Matthew wrote:

“This proposed law is based on the false theory of “structural racism”, unthinkingly imported from the radical left on American college campuses. It unscientifically presupposes that any difference in outcomes must be caused by discrimination, without evidence and before any investigation.

“It ignores the fact that it is already illegal, and has been since 1965, for employers to discriminate based on race. The employment lawyer Darren Newman said it is currently easier to bring a race discrimination claim than a gender pay claim, potentially making Labour’s policy largely futile.

“Despite Labour’s recent pro-business rhetoric, its fiddly new regulation will scare away investment. The only winners will be HR bureaucracies, lawyers and consultants. They will be charged with producing the mandatory new ethnic pay-gap data, which will inevitably fail to explain why individuals are paid differently and will fuel race animosity.”

Read Matthew’s full piece here.