Equality and Human Rights Commission chair Trevor Phillips called for businesses to recognise that diversity should be a source of energy and prosperity, not a cause of friction and inequality, at the Times Responsible Business Conference.

Mr Phillips, chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, said:

'We want to work as partners with the business sector. To put it glibly, we can do it the nice way, or we can do it the not-so-nice way. Our whole approach at the moment is geared towards doing it the nice way. But we have other, sharper tools at our disposal, which we can use if we have to. Our ambition is not to have to take this route. We will only do so where companies don't even look like they're trying to make progress. When practices are heinous enough, and resistance is embedded, we will back invasive investigations, litigation, legislation and coercive frameworks to the hilt. But we want to give people a chance to change first.'

Mr Phillips highlighted specific measures that the Commission wants businesses to employ:

• Creation at board level of an equality champion, much like a chief financial officer.
• Publication of equalities data as a component of annual reporting
• Consideration of equality deficits as part of risk assessment procedures
• Procurement policies used as a lever to achieve greater equality.

A recent piece of research conducted for the Equality and Human Rights Commission revealed that nearly half of us - 46 per cent - think that we have faced discrimination: crucially, 74 per cent of people thought that discrimination was most prevalent in the workplace; and two out of five of those who faced discrimination experienced it in the workplace.

Addressing an audience of board members, directors and managers from the private and not-for-profit sectors, Mr Phillips talked about how society and businesses need to embrace our age of difference:

'Today, global changes of a speed scale and spread not seen before in human history are transforming our world before our eyes. The forces of globalisation - labour market forces, mass communication, rapid technological progress and international travel - are forcing demographic and social changes on a scale and at a pace not seen since the Industrial Revolution. In short, we now live in an age of difference.

'I do not believe that this difference needs to be a trigger for unequal treatment or disadvantage. I think the opposite. In this new world, equality and diversity can be more than a moral or social good: it will deliver a more productive society.

'Every successful business today knows that it needs to manage its place and reputation in the world as actively as it manages its clients, its assets and its accounts. Performance in areas such as attention to the environment and employee diversity are no longer the preserve of a few socially conscious businesses. The implications for business are huge. Many businesses are already on the ball and are already profiting from getting it right before their competitors.'

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