STUC Black Workers Committee Comment on the Scottish Government’s Programme for Government

September 3rd 2020

STUC Black Workers Committee Comment on the Scottish Government’s Programme for Government

September 3rd 2020

Usman Ali, Chair, stated:

“The STUC Black Workers' Committee welcomes the Scottish Government’s Programme for Government which on our count mentioned Black and Minority Ethnic 48 times. We welcome the broad focus on supporting BME Workers and Communities across different policy areas including employment, education, health and housing, we are also pleased to see the announcements covering BME young people, older people and parents.

“Responding to COVID19 and addressing BME employment across all levels in the Scottish Public Sector has been a priority for our committee in recent months. We have seen our work in these two key areas deliver real success for Scotland’s Black and Minority Ethnic Workers and Communities. This success has continued with announcements of a focus to improve BME Specific data and evidence collection, the audit of initiatives tackling systemic racism and the development of a Race Equality Network within the NHS to ensure the BME workforce is supported and encouraged into senior and executive job roles. We will now carefully examine if the actions announced by the Scottish Government today deliver in full what we asked of the Expert Reference Group, in terms of BME people in prison and asylum seekers being two prime examples.

“The STUC Black Workers Committee has engaged the leadership of the John Smith Centre for Public Life to support their thinking leading to today’s announcement of funding for the BME Emerging Leaders Academy. In January 2020, this Committee wrote to the Scottish Government about the need to decolonise the curriculum following a motion at our conference in 2019. We are delighted the Scottish Government has agreed to deliver upon our call today.

“Moving forward, the STUC Black Workers Committee will build upon our past and current achievements by continuing to work with the Scottish Government on developing a Fair Work Race Equality Statement and promoting the use of the Race Employment Toolkit once this has been published.”

ENDS

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