Question
The Sewell report claims that there is no racism in the UK and last week we saw this was a lie following the appalling response from racists towards black footballers. We know racism exists and continues to exist in all walks of life including in Wokingham Borough. It has been over a year since I made a formal complaint relating to WBC’s response to BLM and your response was that Equality is hardwired in WBC's DNA and you were committed to equality. I note today that there is a no team leading equality initiatives anymore, the BME Forum has been disbanded and there has been no real commitment to understand the lives and experience of 155,000 of the non- white population in WBC. What are you really doing to foster good community relationships and eliminate racism in the Borough?
Minutes:
Question
The Sewell report claims that there is no racism in the UK and last week we saw this was a lie following the appalling response from racists towards black footballers. We know racism exists and continues to exist in all walks of life including in Wokingham Borough. It has been over a year since I made a formal complaint relating to WBC’s response to BLM and your response was that equality is hardwired in WBC's DNA and you were committed to equality. I note today that there is a no team leading equality initiatives anymore, the BME Forum has been disbanded and there has been no real commitment to understand the lives and experience of 155,000 (Note: this figure was corrected to 17,000 at the meeting) of the non-white population in WBC. What are you really doing to foster good community relationships and eliminate racism in the Borough?
Answer
Pol, it’s great to see you and you have corrected the question because the 155,000 non-white population was a little erroneous. With the current Office of National Statistics data estimates the population of about 13% identifies as something which is other than white which would be approximately 22,000 people. The census data will be refreshed next year and this will give us a more accurate position.
I refute the suggestion in the question that we have scrapped the BME Forum. Indeed, we have not, and we are very keen to have taken the enabling role to support the BME Forum to deliver on its objectives, purposes and activities. We respect the desire of the Forum to be autonomous and we will work in collaboration to understand the best way we can move forward.
But why the overt concentration on the non-white community the Borough is interested in any of its residents who suffer prejudice or harm, with a view to mitigating, eliminating and repairing the prejudice or harm.
I have spent much of my life engaged in sport, both doing it and coaching. I feel genuinely sorry for sportsmen and women who do not do as well as they might, but hey ho we did get to the final of the Euros which is quite an achievement. We need to celebrate the positives and not dwell on the negatives. Well done the England football team, all of them!
The Council launched its Equality Strategy, “Tackling Inequality Together” in March 2021, which includes a detailed action plan with seven specific workstreams. The management of our Equalities programme continues to be led by the Insight, Strategy and Inclusion Team, as part of the Communities, Insight and Change Directorate.
This Team has recently bolstered its support to the equalities agenda by appointing an interim Equality Lead who has a raft of expertise and is now working with us three days per week, a Senior Specialist Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Officer who will start with us in August, along with a Service Manager of the Insight, Strategy and Inclusion Team who is joining us in September.
The equalities programme is continuing to deliver against the actions as outlined in the plan. The seven specific workstreams are led by Senior Managers across the Council to ensure ownership and accountability. The programme team has recently published an easy read version of the action plan so that more of our residents can access our plans, as well as publishing a community profile to help residents, businesses in the Borough and Officers better understand the makeup of the community.
As part of the Equality Programme, the Council is continuing to support the external review of the BME Forum, which has included over 30 one to one interviews and group discussions and expects to soon be able to work with the Forum to understand how it wants to incorporate the findings from this review in its future activities. As stated within the Council’s Equalities Action Plan, this review is scheduled to be completed by the end of 2021. A key piece of early feedback from the consultants has been the broad ambition for the BME Forum being more independent and self-sustaining in the future, which will be factored into our planning.
Due to the global pandemic, for the past year our engagement activities with ethnic minority groups have been primarily focused on the most urgent need to promoteCovid safety advice, supporting groups to deliver safe activities and to encourage participation in the vaccination and testing programmes that have been quickly implemented to stop the spread of the virus and get us back to normality as quickly as possible.
These activities have been largely successful and well received. We have provided weekly Covid and Community updates to all faith and community groups directly via email and with targeted one to one support, working with local ethnic minority groups to agree communications messages on accessing Covid services, vaccination pop-up sessions at a Mosque, PCR testing at a Gurdwara during surge testing, and direct engagement with local employers to vaccinate migrant workers.
The Council is also supporting the police community engagement programme through their Independent Advisory Group which has a particular focus on understanding residents’ experiences of hate crime.
This Council is also working on a comprehensive plan to foster stronger engagement with local communities. But people shouldn’t wait for us to reach out if they have something to share with us that can improve equality for the residents in our Borough. I would ask that they can get in touch with us so we can listen to them.