The Equality Bill is a vast and expensive bureaucratic maze which should be scrapped, says a Sunday Times columnist.

Harriet Harman’s new Bill would burden public bodies with “astonishingly heavy and expensive obligations” if the Bill became law, wrote Minette Marrin in the Sunday Times.

She said in a time of financial crisis supporters of the Bill “could not argue that this vast agenda, with all its elaborate provisions, is anywhere near as important” as caring for society’s most vulnerable.

Miss Marrin pointed out that next to the “burning needs” of many already “underfunded” public services such as mental health services and care homes, “the costly details of Labour’s equality agenda pale into insignificance”.

She warned that the cost of the Bill was not only “astronomical” but “infinite” as it would be impossible for any organisation to ever achieve complete equality.

Miss Marrin challenged the National Audit Office to reveal costs of the Equality Bill, adding “For if the great British public did know, I suspect there would be no political difficulty for any party in axeing this agenda, to make a huge and popular saving”.

The Equality Bill has been openly criticised by the British Chambers of Commerce, the Confederation of British Industry and the Institute of Directors who all have strong concerns about the major red tape and cost burdens at a time of recession.