Our Policy on Generic Equality Work

  1. The Equality act 2006 created the Equality and Human Rights Commission with duties to promote understanding and good practice on equality, diversity and human rights, promote equality of opportunity between people in the different groups protected by discrimination law, work towards the elimination of unlawful discrimination and harassment, and promote good relations between members of different groups and between members of those groups and others in the wider society.  The Equality and Human Rights Commission opened on 1 October 2007, the day after the Commission for Race Equality closed its doors on 31 September 2007.

 

  1. The decision to replace the CRE, dealing only with race, with the generic EHRC, dealing with six major dimensions of inequality as well as human rights, created anxiety and speculation within race equality circles, over the future of specialist regional and local race equality organisations, such as REWM.

 

  1. Some former race equality councils have already transformed themselves into generic or multi-strand equality bodies, such as the Dudley Centre for Equality and Diversity.

 

  1. There is already pressure from public authorities and those concerned with the future funding of voluntary sector race equality organisations to explore the possibilities for moving towards multi- strand equality arrangements at local level.

 

  1. They regard it as desirable and inevitable that the economic rationalisation and simplification that brought about the EHRC will be reproduced in some form at local level.

 

  1. Nevertheless, communities genrally remain fractured along lines of social class, race, culture and, to a lesser extent, religion.  Community tension and conflict continue overwhelmingly to be related to perceived differences of colour, race, ethnicity, national origin and religion.  While considerations of age, gender, disability, and sexual orientation may play a part in social exclusion and isolation, the elderly, the young, women, disabled, and LGBT alike, are members of all local residential communities.

 

  1. REWM believes that in regard to functions relating to community development, specialist race equality organisations should continue to concentrate their efforts on race and religious relations, which together with the social class differences associated with them, are uniquely in need of attention and intervention.

 

  1. Race equality organisations should consider very carefully any decision to jettison their specialist work on promoting good relations between racial groups, improving community cohesion, and resolving conflict between different racial and religious communities.

 

  1. Race equality organisations have a clear competitive advantage over other agencies in the public, voluntary and community sectors in promoting positive relations between ethnic communities.  The consequences of relinquishing this advantage in favour of a less specific generic equality approach need careful consideration.

 

  1. Rights and Equality West Midlands, while having no intrinsic objection to broadening the remit of its work (and indeed has long had an interest in promoting human rights more generally), recognises that its specialist expertise and experience lie in the field of race relations and community conflict resolution. A need remains for these specialisms to be embedded at local level.

 

  1. REWM belives that small, specialist voluntary sector race equality organisations will find it difficult, if not impossible, to acquire community development expertise in equal measure across all strands of equality work, and that they risk losing their competitive edge in their efforts to do so.

 

  1. A helpful analogy is with a fruit orchard containing different kinds of fruit tree: apples, pears, plums, apricots, hazel, and chestnut.  Each kind of tree requires a different kind of husbandry: to produce the best fruit, they cannot be treated alike, although they share the orchard in common, and will all benefit from the general care and protection given to it.

 

  1. A strong argument has been put, however, for specialist race equality organisations to extend their casework arrangements to deal with discrimination on grounds of race, age, gender, disability, religion or belief, and sexual orientation.

 

  1. Given the symmetry between race, religion or belief, sex and sexual orientation, employment law, this is a perfectly feasible proposal.  An extension of function along these lines, however, raises questions about race equality organisations’ specialist or niche status.  If they were to take on these other types of discrimination case, in what way would their services differ from those of Citizens Advice Bureaux and local law centres?

 

  1. The answer could lie in their specialising in discrimination law, particularly in regard to employment.  In recent years, however, fewer REOs have offered legal information, advice, guidance, and case work services, and less still, resource-hungry Employment Tribunal (ET) representation.

 

  1. Functions such as legal casework for complainants of discrimination, are most susceptible to the adoption of a multi-strand equality approach.  Other functions in the area of community support, such as the promotion of good relations between racial groups, community bridge-building, or the improvement of the health and quality of life of minority ethnic communities, are special and unique to the work of race equality organisations.

 

  1. Ill-considered attempts to adopt a multi-strand equality approach to these functions are likely to be counterproductive and result in a deterioration of focus on community cohesion and on the promotion of race equality, the loss of much-needed specialist skills, and, possibly, the eventual disappearence of specialist agencies able to deal with specifically-ethnic conflict resolution.  This could have potentially disastrous consequences, leading to the disappearence of independent agencies for ethnic conflict resolution and for countering racist or violent extremism.  This is precisely the scenario which Northern towns faced in 2001 and were criticised for.

 

  1. Put more directly, unless the unique contribution of REOs to race equality and inter-ethnic community cohesion is recognised, the creation of the EHRC, with its emphasis on rationalising the framework of discrimination law, together with uncritical attempts to emulate and reproduce structures like it at local level, could result in the neglect and eventual collapse of the unique, organically-developed, and socially invaluable local race equality movement.

 

  1. Nevertheless, there is still considerable scope for creatively, but cautiously, exploring the potential for expanding the boundaries of our current work and for regarding multi-strand approaches to equality promotion as opportunities rather than threats.

 

  1. Rights and Equality West Midlands intends to develop guidance to assist race equality organisations adjusts to the new era of the Equality and Human Rights Commission without incurring loss of purpose, function, or community support in the process.

 

  1. We shall attempt to develop a mutually-supportive partnership with our new national strategic body, the Equality and Human Rights Commission, and to advise it on the grass-roots needs of the race equality movement.

 

 

  

 

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