Commission for Racial Equality - Richard Commission Evidence Session at Cardiff 25th July 2003

AM BRIEFING: ETHNIC MINORITIES AND THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY FORWALES

This briefing is to help Assembly Members and their staff to mainstream racial equality and promote good race relations in all of their activities over the next four years.

YOUR RESPONSIBILITIES AND THE PUBLIC DUTY

As a result of the Race Relations (Amendment) Act 2000 (RR(A)A) the National Assembly for Wales (the Assembly) is under a duty to eliminate unlawful racial discrimination, promote equality of opportunity and promote good race relations between people of different racial groups in all that it does. It should be noted that the Public Duty is consistent with the equality clauses of the Government of Wales Act 1998, which also place a duty on the Assembly to work in accordance with the principle of equality of opportunity for all people. Consequently, the Public Duty must surely play an important consideration in your role and responsibilities as an Assembly Member for the next four years.

The catalyst for the (RR(A)A) was the murder of a young black man in London ten years ago, called Stephen Lawrence. The Stephen Lawrence Inquiry by Sir William MacPherson was published on 24 February 1999 and proved a watershed for British race relations. Its findings and recommendations provided the CRE with a new framework for its work. Most of the concerns and issues raised in the Report were incorporated into the RR(A)A, thereby outlawing institutional racism in every public authority and private body commissioned to carry out public services by public bodies.

The RR(A)A places a new general statutory duty on public authorities to promote racial equality. The General Duty applies to all public authorities listed in schedule 1A of the statutory Code of Practice. The aim of the duty is to make the promotion of racial equality central to the work of the listed public authorities, and to ensure that 43,000 public bodies throughout Great Britain produce race equality schemes (or race equality policies in schools).

1. Your Responsibilities & the Public Duty
2. Census 2001
3. Useful Statistics
4. CRE Wales & Political Parties
5. A WEMA Report; Useful Contacts2

As a result, maintained schools, further and higher education institutions, police forces and authorities, criminal justice agencies and local authorities etc. in Wales must work towards eliminating unlawful racial discrimination and to promote good race relations. The duty is not optional and these authorities must meet their duties even if the ethnic minority populations they serve are very small. Clearly, the ways in which they approach the question of race equality and meet their duties naturally have the power to profoundly affect people's lives in Wales.

Transforming public sector performance on racial equality follows a ten-year agenda. In five years time we would expect to see year-on-year improvement inn,

• representative staffing profiles at all levels;

• parity in satisfaction with public services across ethnic groups;

• parity in public confidence levels with public services across ethnic groups; 

• a closer match between established service need and service provision across ethnic groups;

• a closing of the gaps in service outcomes (for example educational attainment and mortality ratios);

• and racial equality built into the way we do things in terms of how services operate.

In the longer term we hope these measures will contribute to a more cohesive Britain where all communities are served equally well by modern public services fit for a diverse society.

An early recognition, from analysing the results of the 2001 Census, was the dearth of quality statistics to further bolster our understanding of the experience of ethnic minority groups in Wales. Indeed this paper serves as a permanent reminder of our need to develop good quality baseline research in Wales as all information has been garnered from GB-wide studies or research undertaken by voluntary bodies. We would ask that Assembly Members, as a matter of urgency, press for more research on the experiences of ethnic minorities in Wales to better inform policy thinking and development.

At the 2001 census, 2.7% of the 2.9 million people living in Wales were from ethnic minority groups. The main concentration of ethnic minorities by local authority area is in South Wales. Cardiff has the highest number and proportion of visible ethnic minorities in its population (just under 26,000 or 8.4 per cent) followed by Newport (nearly 7,000 or 4.8 per cent) and then Swansea (nearly 5,000 or 2.2 per cent).

Making up 0.29% of the Welsh population as a whole, people of Pakistani origin are the most common group among the ethnic minority population in Wales. This is also true of the South Wales East (0.37%) and South Wales Central (0.73%) regions.

However, the most common ethnic background in North Wales is Chinese (0.16%); in Mid and West Wales Mixed Race (specifically White & Asian (0.12%)); whilst in South Wales West the most common ethnic background is Bangladeshi, making up 0.25% of that region's population.

The results of the 2001 Census marked an important moment in recognising the extent of diversity in Wales today, and the complexity of its ethnic minority population. Though the earliest black community in Wales goes back to 1870 (and even further for the settlement of individual slaves), there has been a lack of real engagement with ethnic minorities over the years. The Census, therefore, underlines the vibrant and multicultural nature of this small country, and serves as a reminder of the need to improve the ways in which we secure racial equality in Wales.

Please see the related KS06 table to this paper for, percentage of ethnic minority groups in Assembly constituencies and regions.

More than half the people from ethnic minority backgrounds in the south Wales Valleys have experienced racism in the last two years. Valleys REC Survey

It.is thought that some 11 languages are commonly spoken in Wales by ethnic minority groups, taut the four most common languages are Arabic, Bengali, Punjabi and Somali.

• The largest concentration of refugees and asylum seekers in Wales is Cardiff, followed by Newport and Swansea. Refugees in Wales: An Invisible Minority;Robinson, V 1997

• Among all ethnicities, the most likely to be discriminated against are refugees and asylum seekers (60%).

• 61% of the overall population, and 46% of ethnic minority groups, believe that there are too many immigrants in Britain. The Voice of Britain Mori Poll, May 2002

• Ethnic minorities are underrepresented as employees in all grades in the police and prison services, and in senior posts in all criminal justice agencies.

• Compared to white counterparts, you are 8 times more likely to be stopped and searched if you are a young black man & 3 times more likely if Asian Home Office section 95 report 2001

• The risk of racially motivated offences for white people is 0.4%, compared with 2.2% for black people, 3.6% for Indians and 4.2% for Pakistanis and Bangladeshis. British Crime Survey of 2000

• Black Caribbean pupils are 3 times more likely, and pupils classified as Black Other are almost 4 times more likely to be permanently excluded than their white peers. YES, Statistics First Release, SFR10/2002

• Bangladeshis and Pakistanis are two and a _ half times more likely than the white population to be unemployed and nearly three times more likely to be in low paid jobs.

• 6 in 10 Pakistanis and Bangladeshis living in Britain are poor - 4 times the poverty rate found among white people.

• 2 in 3 women think race can limit either a person's choice of career or career progression.

• 3 in 4 women are against positive discrimination at work in terms of race, age or sex.

• Nearly all women think health professions offer the most opportunities to ethnic minorities.

• 1 in 5 women do not have any friends from different racial backgrounds.

• 1 in 4 women would never have a mixed race relationship. She/CRE Survey on Race, April 2002

CRE WALES & POLITICAL PARTIES

The CRE is a publicly funded, nongovernmental body set up under the Race Relations Act 1976 to work towards the elimination of racial discrimination; promote equality of opportunity and encourage good relations between people from different ethnic or racial backgrounds; and to monitor the way the Race Relations Act (as amended in 2000) is working and recommend ways in which it can be improved.

The CRE Wales office in Cardiff was set up in 1995 and it works with both the public and private sectors to encourage fair treatment and to promote equality of opportunity. This includes the Assembly, as the Government of Wales Act 1998 established a new kind of politics, rooted in a more open and participatory democracy. CRE Wales has taken many steps to support and advise the Assembly since its establishment, including an advisory role within the Equality of Opportunity Committee.

Its work was assisted by the political compact signed by the main political parties in the run-up to the general election in March 2001. Signing the compact on behalf of the four main political parties in Wales were Lord Dafydd Elis-Thomas, Rhodri Morgan, Edwina Hart, Ieuan Wyn Jones, Mike

German and Nick Bourne. This compact promoted the need for robust political debate within clear parameters governing good race relations, and is still in effect today relating to all political activities, including the last Assembly elections in 2003.

Members of ethnic minority communities and other groups have faced longstanding patterns of inequality in Wales. For the next four years, equality campaigners (who sought to address the situation and successfully lobbied for the inclusion of two equality clauses to be included in the Government of Wales Act 1998) are likely to now evaluate the performance of the Assembly, its constituent parts, and all political parties in relation to each clause.

"The Assembly shall make appropriate
arrangements with a view to securing that
its business is conducted with due regard to
the principle that there should be equality
of opportunity for all people." (Section 40)

"The Assembly shall make appropriate
arrangements with a view to securing that
its functions are exercised with due regard
to the principle that there should be
equality of opportunity for all people."
(Section 120)

The Government of Wales Act 1998

The role of political parties and their representatives in achieving the vision enshrined in the equality clauses of the Government of Wales Act is critical. Party policy drives the agenda of the Assembly and party procedures determine who sits in that body. It should therefore be a central question for all parties and their representatives, as to how they embody the founding principles of the Assembly and the shared values to which a devolved Wales aspires.

Having established the compact as a starting point, the CRE met with all the political parties represented in the Assembly to talk about "Politics, Representation and Engagement: Race and Political Parties in Wales". Serving as a reminder of the parties' long-term responsibilities in building a fair and equal future for all people in Wales, the paper highlights some of the longterm issues which parties need to address in relation to racial equality. It also offers possible approaches to critically and regularly assess structures and procedures to remove barriers to participation, by positively influencing debate and developing policy which promotes racial equality.

Whilst a positive framework does exist for the promotion of racial equality in a. devolved context, the struggle to achieve meaningful change and deliver against a "new politics" is great. But having already secured cross-party support for the paper in March 2003, the future for a more open Assembly seems bright, as there is now a strong commitment to think about race for the long term and not just for an election campaign. For further information, or copies of the paper, please contact Carys Thomas on 02920 729 200 (ext.202).

Awema's (All Wales Ethnic Minority Association) Right to Vote project recently commissioned research with the University of Swansea to establish "BMEs (Black and Asian minority ethnic) communities' level of ^ political participation in Wales".

Structured interviews with "bme voters" were carried out between July and October 2002, providing findings on political identities and attitudes, levels of electoral turnout in the UK and Welsh elections, and party voting between 1997 and 2002. Confirming the need for more extensive research in this area, a number of interesting features came to light from those questioned:

• 31.2% had no sense of British or Welsh identity;

• 40.4% have no identification with a political party;

• 33.2% think that who wins the Assembly elections in 2003 is unimportant; and

• between 10 and 14% of "bme voters" in Wales are actually not registered to vote. This is four times the level for the Welsh electorate as a whole.

For further information and/or complete copies of the research, please contact Rez Jamal at AWEMA on 02920 664123.

Commission for Racial Equality in Wales
Capital Tower (3rd Floor) Greyfriars Road
Cardiff
CF10 3AG
Tel: 02920 729 200
Fax: 02920 729 220
Deputy Head: Bailjit Gill
Press & Public Affairs Officer: Carys Thomas

The Race Relations Act makes it unlawful to discriminate against anyone on grounds of race, colour, nationality, ethnic or national origins. The Commission for Racial Equality was established under the Act to work for the elimination of discrimination, the promotion of equality of opportunity and good race relations generally.

The Commission can advise or assist people with cases before courts and employment tribunals and can conduct its own investigations when it has grounds to believe discrimination may be taking place.

Public bodies have a duty to eliminate discrimination in the way they work and to promote equality of opportunity and good race relations. The Commission is working to help them deliver this duty.