Cumbria County Council has promised to take a series of steps aimed at tackling racism and inequality.
COVID-19 has highlighted the stark race inequalities that continue to exist and the need for public organisations to do all they can to address discrimination.
To mark the UN’s International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination last Sunday, Cumbria County Council will:
- Affirm their commitment to race equality and anti-racism;
- Set out how the commitment links to its Equality Objectives for 2020-24;
- Highlight some of the work they have been doing to promote race equality;
- Provide support for the Cumbria Race Equality Forum and county-wide organisations promoting race equality and anti-racism.
Commitment
As a local authority, it says it has a particular role to play in demonstrating community leadership. This means:
- Promoting equality across services, relations with communities and in their role as a major employer;
- Strongly condemning all forms of racism, hate and discrimination, as well as any bullying and harassment targeting people of any particular racial or ethnic origin, religion or belief, and nationality;
- Sharing best practice on race equality and working with partners in the public sector, the community and wider society.
This means they are:
- Open and responsible – acknowledging starting points, being held to account and enabling broader community dialogue on race equality;
- Strong allies – calling out racism in all its forms and using the means at their disposal to raise awareness, tackle hate crime and foster good community relations;
- Advocates for systemic change – recognise that racial discrimination sits within other inequalities – not least poverty; understand the role of institutions in enabling change or putting up barriers;
- Proactive with communities and their workforce – supporting those with a life experience of racial discrimination to be shaping their activity;
Equality Objectives 2020-24
Their commitment to race equality and anti-racism sits within a broader equalities framework set out in the following objectives. These relate to:
- Services and partnerships having clear information about Cumbria’s diversity profile to inform public services;
- People who have experience of discrimination being involved in shaping public policy in Cumbria;
- Commissioning and prevention work tackling structural inequalities;
- Employment outcomes demonstrating the benefits of a proactive approach to equalities;
- COVID-19 recovery actively addressing structural inequalities, including those caused by socio-economic inequality.
Work they are doing to promote Race Equality
- Anti-racism project with schools: They have begun working with Anti-Racism Cumbria and the school system to look at developing an anti-racist curriculum;
- Black Histories Matter: Each year their library and archives service works with local community groups to develop programmes for BLM each October;
- Community Integration: They have just finished a programme to develop community integration activities in areas with the highest concentrations of migrants and are evaluating it to look at how it embeds it into their community grants programme;
- Culture change: Race Equality Staff Network is working with the council’s People Management Team to raise internal organisational awareness of race equality and anti-racism. They have also changed their Equality training to strengthen staff awareness of race equality and made it mandatory. They will also be designing new equality training for elected members;
- Active Cumbria: Working on a project to embed Sports England’s national race equality standards across all physical activity programmes.
Cumbria Race Equality Network
In 2021 Cumbria Race Equality Network was established to provide space for different race equality and anti-racist projects to come together with organisations such as the county council.
“We know sadly that every year several members of the racial and ethnic minorities are subject to harassment, violence and hate crime, both online and offline,” said Stewart Young, leader of Cumbria County Council.
“We also know that some members of the racial and ethnic minorities face structural barriers in accessing services, due to capacity issues or a lack of intercultural understanding of needs and aspirations in areas including housing, health and social care, employment, training, apprenticeships and education.”
Marcia Reid Fotheringham, co-chairwoman of the Cumbria Race Equality Network added: “While many assume there is little need to still focus on racial equality, it is clear that, in Cumbria, the goal of racial fairness and justice has not yet been achieved.
“Cumbria Race Equality Network (a leadership group) highlights racial (and other) injustices and holds people and organisations to account.
“We also acknowledge examples of good practice in this regard. While Cumbria is becoming more and more diverse, our diversity must be better valued. Racial intolerance must not be accepted in our families, social groups, workplaces or anywhere in our county.”
