Originally published here.
Too few Birmingham organisations - including the Commonwealth Games set-up - reflect the city's exceptional diversity, according to race activists.
Birmingham 2022, the organisation behind next year's Commonwealth Games, still "fails to come close to reflecting the Black, Asian and other minority ethnic roots of over half the city," race activists claimed today.
They say positive work on boosting diversity representation on the Birmingham 2022 Board has not filtered into recruitment, with fewer than one in five (or 18 per cent) of the people employed so far by the Games coming from ethnic diverse backgrounds, despite making up nearly half of the local population.
Only a small proportion of managers (seven per cent) are of Black or Asian origin.
The data is due to be updated in the new year, says Birmingham 2022 - but it demonstrates there remains 'a huge challenge ahead' for the city's most prominent public, private and voluntary organisations in the battle for true equality, said the city's new Birmingham Race Impact Group (BRIG).
The Games team defended its recruitment record and said the top priority of its inclusion and diversity strategy was to "develop a workforce reflective of the West Midlands".
Head of Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion at Birmingham 2022, Donna Fraser, said: "We are constantly looking for ambitious people who meet the criteria of the available roles who can be a part of delivering something spectacular for the region,"
The BRIG group, formed in the wake of the Black Lives Matter protests last summer, is campaigning for prominent organisations to make written pledges on diversity in recruitment within three years.
Jagwant Johal, representing the group, praised Birmingham 2022's swift response to complaints last year about a lack of diversity in its leadership.
At the time, 19 out of 20 senior Board and executive team roles were held by white people - and when this was exposed by BirminghamLive, a citywide action campaign followed, pressing for action.
This included a letter signed by leading celebrities, business leaders and activists that was the catalyst that led, within weeks, to one Board representative organisation changing their nominated member, and vacancies filled since have increased ethnic representation.
Said Johal: "The Birmingham Commonwealth Games 2022 Board of Directors was overhauled in less than a month for not being fully representative of the city's diversity, following a community led challenge.
"This was a tacit acknowledgement they had not quite got the optics right. After all, it was Birmingham's diversity that got the Games here in the first place," he added.
Newcomers Geoff Thompson, Sandra Osborne, Ama Agzebe and Hiren Dhimar have since taken up Board vacancies or replaced outgoing members.
However, these efforts to bring more diverse voices to the top table have been difficult to repeat in recruitment to the general Games workforce, according to Birmingham 2022's own data.
It shows, for example, that while 32 per cent of the West Midlands workforce (and 47 per cent of the Birmingham workforce) is of an ethnically diverse background, just 18 per cent of all Games workers so far, and seven per cent of managers, are of Black, Asian or other ethnic minority origin.
By contrast 68 per cent of the West Midlands; working population is white, yet 81 per cent of higher band positions, and 88 per cent of all Games employees, are white.
There are issues too around the Games' ability to recruit people with disabilities, and those who declare Muslim as their religion, according to Birmingham 2022's published data.
Mr Johal said it was "not unexpected" to people of colour to feel that "the diversity they provide has become an inward investment brand which they do not themselves benefit from."
He said it had been heartening to view the response from the Birmingham 2022 leaders to the challenge around Board membership - but the question now was whether it had triggered change within the whole organisation.
"And are Birmingham's Black, Asian and minority led businesses benefitting (from contracts linked to the Games), or are these communities just going to end up being recruited to the volunteering programmes while the remunerated jobs go elsewhere?
"If this happens, the Board overhaul might be viewed as no more than performative," he said.
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He said that BRIG acknowledged the work of Birmingham 2022 to openly discuss and publish its action plan and achievements around diversity - in a way that prominent private sector organisations did not, for example.
"The bigger question is what other changes have taken place at the top table for the rest of Birmingham's public, voluntary and private sector leadership since last year?"
Most other city organisations are also having difficulty addressing disparity in leadership, with most senior positions still taken by white people, said Mr Johal.
The BRIG organisation, drawn from influencers and activists across the city, has been campaigning for 'action not words' on equality in leadership on health, council and university boards in the city.
"The majority of boards remain white. Where there is a splash of colour, it is limited to roughly a few people of colour, who might be "viewed as diversity hires", claimed Mr Johal.
BRIG is lobbying for financial incentives for some settings - universities for example - to encourage them to address the shortfall.
Universities are incentivised to ensure gender equality - the same should be done to ensure a greater balance on ethnic diversity, he said.
"If it’s good enough for women, why is it not for people of colour?" asked Mr Johal.
The group is also urging the city's institutions to follow Birmingham City Council and others to sign up to the new Race Equality Code, launched by Karl George in 2020, and to consider making a pledge about what its diversity profile should look like in three years.
"This will at least set a commendable threshold for the public to judge genuine intent," he said.
"There really is no excuse," he added.
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