Agenda item

H Crabtree, Corporate Manager Human Resources, was present to speak to this item.  He circulated a document entitled Northampton Borough Council HIV Policy Employment, which he stressed was a draft policy and the way forward to look at HIV and employment in its entirety, and stated it was before this Group for its views and comments accordingly.  He stated that the question on the occupational health questionnaire had been changed and that the Borough Council had recently agreed a new Diversity and Equality Policy and that had been used as the basis of the HIV policy on employment.  Also Manchester’s and the Terence Higgins Trust’s policies had been used to assist in the production of the Borough Council’s Policy.  He added that no job applicant was required to take an HIV test.  Furthermore the draft Policy stressed confidentiality and the Borough Council did not see the occupational health questionnaire.  It was noted that pension benefits were not related to HIV status.  He commented that the Policy had been submitted to this Forum prior to going to any other group.

Andrew stated that he was still disappointed in relation to the actual question regarding HIV and he still failed to understand why it was actually necessary to need to ask about HIV.  He stated that a person diagnosed in 2006 with HIV was able to live a normal lifespan and therefore why was there the need to ask the question.  He also had an issue in terms of how Medigold dealt with the information it received.  He expressed the view that there was a lack of clarity on how or why Medigold would divulge the information on HIV.  L Ambrose reminded the Forum that T Welsh had also expressed concerns that some information on the form might be forwarded to the applicant’s GP.  H Crabtree stated that the question had remained on the form until such time as this Group was able to discuss the matter and commented that if the question were to remain on the form then the Council would be prepared to add in some sort of caveat giving some reassurance that confidentiality would be strictly observed.  He stated that he was assured, having discussed the matter with Medigold, that confidentiality was maintained.  Therefore it was down to whether the question should be in or not.  Andrew commented that if there was an issue that had arisen out of the HIV status then that could be identified as the issue, rather than the HIV itself. and that was the road that he would want to go down.  He added that there were also one or two issues about the language on the form that needed to be given more thought.  H Crabtree agreed that he would await further feedback from Andrew and then produce a further draft and that in the interim he would give further thought to the symptoms of HIV rather than the HIV status itself.  It was noted that the Disabled Peoples Forum had also questioned the way the Medigold pre-employment health questionnaire had been worded in part.  For example, question 41 rather than saying, “Is there anything else you should declare?” could be worded to say, “Is there anything else you might like to tell us?” thus making the form more user friendly.  The Group welcomed the fact that there was now a positive move towards getting an HIV employment policy and it was agreed that the Group take this away to consider and that any further comments on the draft be passed to L Ambrose by the end of this month so that the comments could be passed on for consideration prior to compilation of the final draft accordingly.