Race against time

For more than a quarter of a century, local authorities have been required, by law, to combat race discrimination. Will further duties imposed by the Race Relations (Amendment) Act 2000 help them make real gains in race equality?

KEY POINTS

 

  • The Race Relations (Amendment) Act 2000 required all public bodies to establish policies promoting race equality by 31 May 2002.

  • The Commission for Racial Equality (CRE) will help public authorities promote race equality by identifying examples of good practice.

    When a Labour government introduced the Race Relations Act in 1976, race discrimination in local government, particularly in the allocation of council housing, was a major concern. Section 71 of the Act placed a duty on local authorities to exercise their functions with due regard to the need to eliminate unlawful racial discrimination, and to promote equality of opportunity and good relations between people of different racial groups. This provision was made to ensure, if only in a general way, that local authorities were actively addressing racism.

    During the 1980s, the use of section 71 under contract compliance policies became a matter of deep conflict between a number of Labour local authorities and the Conservative government under Margaret Thatcher.

    A typical contract compliance policy would involve a large local authority, such as the Greater London Council, using section 71 of the Race Relations Act, together with elements of the Equal Pay Act 1970, the Sex Discrimination Act 1974 and the Disabled Persons (Employment) Act 1944, as a justification for requiring its many contractors and suppliers to adopt thorough approaches to equal opportunities.

    Seen as an unnecessary burden on business, contract compliance remained unpopular with the Conservative government. The 1988 Local Government Act prohibited councils from asking contractors about their employment practices in the areas of gender and disability. The Act seriously limited their role in promoting race equality to introducing a prescribed list of race relations questions into contract documentation.

    Although the 1997 Labour Party manifesto specified the introduction of contract compliance as an element of the new government's approach to securing equality of opportunity in the new Britain, no mention has been made of it since. The government is keen not to impose such a burden on business, preferring to focus on the activities of public sector organisations.

    The public inquiry into the racist murder of Stephen Lawrence and subsequent report has been the impetus behind the Race Relations (Amendment) Act 2000, which extends the section 71 duty from applying only to local authorities, to applying to all public bodies. The report's emphasis on the widespread presence of institutional racism left the government with no alternative but to make the public sector more accountable for the promotion of race equality.

    The new duty

    The Race Relations (Amendment) Act 2000 required all public bodies to establish policies promoting race equality by 31 May 20021. Public bodies include government departments, local authorities, the police, NHS bodies, non-departmental public bodies, public sector schools and further and higher education organisations.

    Specific duties to promote race equality are not uniform across the public sector, and include duties for schools and further and higher education institutions, which concentrate primarily on staff, students and pupils.

    Public sector bodies were required, before the May deadline, to have published a Race Equality Scheme describing:

  • public functions that are relevant to the new duty;

  • arrangements for assessing and consulting on proposed policies;

  • plans for monitoring any adverse impact of their policies on the promotion of race equality;

  • arrangements for publication of the results of their assessments;

  • arrangements for consultations and monitoring;

  • how they will ensure public access to information and to services; and

  • arrangements for training staff in issues relevant to the new duty.

    George Bishop, personnel director at the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, says that local authorities will be making a mistake if their race equality statements are over-prescriptive. He says that as far as service provision is concerned, such statements should only form the basis of the outcome of consultation with local ethnic communities (see extract from Kensington and Chelsea's statement).

    The Commission for Racial Equality (CRE) will help public authorities promote race equality by identifying examples of good practice. The CRE will shortly be issuing a statutory Code of Practice to help authorities further by providing guidance on meeting their new obligations. The Code will be admissible in evidence in any legal proceedings.

    The CRE has also published a range of guidance documents which, like the Code, are intended to be helpful. These may also be taken into account in legal proceedings. The CRE is advising public sector HR practitioners to use the Code and the relevant guidance documents to help them apply the new duties to their own organisations.

    All complaints relating to the duty will be channelled through the CRE. If a public authority fails to meet its specific duties, the CRE can take enforcement action requiring a body to comply.

    Private good, public bad

    It has been mooted that the private sector will be next in line for a statutory duty to promote race equality. Wilf Sullivan, the TUC's race adviser, is sceptical. He says that there is a general attitude in government that the private sector does everything best, including equal opportunities. As far as equal employment opportunities are concerned, he regards this analysis as simplistic and unhelpful. "Whether it is the private or the public sector, organisations must invest in their workforce, and it does not matter if you are talking about race equality or anything else - if employers don't pay sufficient attention to staff development issues they are not going to be successful in business or in ensuring race equality," he says.

    Although Sullivan feels that local authorities have made considerable strides in race equality over the past 20 years, progress has now ground to a halt and even gone into reverse in some instances. He says that during the late 1970s and early 1980s many groundbreaking initiatives were taken by councils to promote race equality, such as equality training, ethnic monitoring, target-setting and a host of positive action measures, particularly around management training.

    Sullivan claims that local government approaches to race equality have become far too mechanistic. "Lots of people monitor policies, but very few do anything about it," he says. He is concerned too, that the new duty to promote race equality is centred far too much on inputs, rather than outputs, and will only serve bureaucracy.

    For Sullivan, a major weakness of the new legislation is that it does not address the issue of local authority procurement, in particular the contracting out of services, because the duty does not override a local authority's duty to obtain best value from a contracting exercise. He explains that the government made attempts to reassure the trade unions that the general duty to eliminate racial discrimination and to promote equality of opportunity does cover private sector companies providing public services. But in reality, under the Act, any enforcement action can only be taken against a public authority.

    Clearly, the TUC would welcome the introduction of mandatory public sector contract compliance covering a range of factors including measures to combat race discrimination. "Our view is that no distinction should be made between public and private sectors when it comes to securing equality of opportunity," says Sullivan.

    Next steps

    Andrew Buchanan, HR adviser at Lewisham Council, describes the next major steps for local authorities - performance indicators on race, gender and disability.

    The Equality Standard for Local Government (ESLG) has been introduced nationally.It provides a model for individual authorities' equalities performance to be analysed.Lewisham has been working on developing an IT workbook which provides a framework for assessing their Council's performance against these ESLG standards.

    The workbook, currently a prototype in line with the ESLG, addresses race, sex and disability issues in four areas (see Figure 1):

  • leadership and corporate commitment;

  • consultation, community development and scrutiny;

  • service delivery and customer care; and

  • employment and training.

    The idea, says Buchanan, is to compare equality intentions with evidence of what has been achieved, which is simply a practical way of making progress. The tool can be used by people within a disparate local authority structure and then collated and analysed.

    1.The new duty to promote race equality .

    2.The ESLG is a national scheme developed in partnership with the Commission for Racial Equality, the Equal Opportunities Commission, the Disability Rights Commission and the Employers' Organisation for local government.

    A series of booklets covering public authorities' new statutory duties can be obtained from the Commission for Racial Equality at www.cre.gov.uk.
    Guidance for NHS bodies is available from the Department of Health at www.doh.gov.uk/race_equality/index.htm

    Artwork - Figure 1: Equality Standard for Local Government (draft)

    XpertHR article image

    Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea
    Race Equality Scheme implementation

    Initial screening of services

     

    The initial stage in implementing the Race Equality Scheme was to review all the council's services and policies to determine their importance in promoting race equality. Each business group examined its own areas of responsibility and conducted this initial screening.

    The screening examined the ethnic profile of service users, whether different ethnic groups had different needs, issues and priorities and whether these groups had been consulted. It also reviewed the level of complaints from users for any evidence of possible discrimination. Finally the screening process considered whether any changes to policies and procedures would help to promote equality of opportunity.

     

    Setting the programme

     

    As a result of the internal screening exercise, a draft programme of race equality reviews has been drawn up covering a three-year period. This programme will be amended as necessary once the views of ethnic groups have been collected as a further part of the screening process. The draft programme is set out in Appendix 2.

    All services with a significant potential impact on race equality will be reviewed over the three-year period and there will be a review of the programme at the end of the three years.

     

    Race equality reviews

     

    Each review will involve an examination of:

  • whether there is over- or under-representation of service users amongst different ethnic groups and possible reasons for this;

  • any particular needs, experiences, issues or priorities for different ethnic groups; and

  • what changes need to be introduced in response to the findings which would better meet, promote and address race equality.

    The race equality review is essentially an audit of the service, using appropriate information including the views of users. On completion of the review, the results and any proposed actions will be published.

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    New policies

     

    The race equality scheme programme does not only cover existing policies and services. New policies will also be reviewed for their significance in terms of race equality and their impact on people of different racial groups.

     

    Schools

     

    In parallel to the specific duties placed on the council, schools also have specific duties. In addition to preparing a written statement of its policy for promoting race equality, each governing body will set out its arrangements for meeting its duties to:

  • assess the impact of its policies, including race equality, on pupils, staff and parents from different racial groups including the impact on attainment levels; and

  • monitor the impact of such policies on attainment levels.

    • Training

     

    As part of the race equality review process, the council will offer training and briefing to staff and members on equalities issues. This will include:

  • specific information on the council's equalities policy as part of the induction of new employees;

  • training for those involved in conducting race equality reviews and assessing new services and policies for their impact on race relations; and

  • training activities, which will involve the use of the Community Associate Trainers drawn from the local community, wherever possible.

    • Consultation

     

    The council places great importance on consulting with individuals, organisations and partner agencies in the development and implementation of the Race Equality Scheme. The process should be transparent and open to challenge.

    The council will consult with relevant parties as a further part of the screening process, the race equality reviews and, where appropriate, the introduction of new policies and services. The Borough Community Relations Advisory Group will be asked to assist in identifying appropriate consultation groups.

    The consultation process will be ongoing, rather than a one-off activity, to ensure that the views of people and organisations are considered at all stages, from the initial screening process through to annual reviews. Key outcomes for the initial consultation planned for 2002 will be to:

  • gain, from ethnic groups, a better understanding of their views and experiences of council services and how council services can be developed or changed to meet the needs of ethnic communities;

  • develop a process of meaningful and ongoing consultation that takes account of language, culture and other issues that may traditionally inhibit people from participating in consultation; and

  • understand how other local public agencies intend to consult and develop their race equality schemes and identify opportunities for working in partnership.

    The methods used will depend on the needs of specific ethnic groups and on the service being reviewed, but could include meetings or workshops, focus groups, surveys or residents' panels.

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    Communications

     

    As part of the Race Equality Scheme, the council will review the way in which it communicates with residents to ensure that ethnic groups, particularly those whose first language is not English, have access to information and services. Key documents, including this Scheme, will be translated into the main languages present within the Royal Borough.

     

    Publication of results

     

    The council will publish a summary of the results of each race equality review. The summary will set out the way in which the review was conducted, consultation undertaken, the results, agreed actions and future monitoring arrangements.

    A review of the entire three-year programme will also be published at the end of that period.

    The council's Race Equality Scheme is available on www.rbkc.gov.uk .