Respondent’s name: Ele Hicks
Respondent’s Role: Policy, Engagement and Research Manager
Organisation:Diverse Cymru
Contact details
Email:
Phone:
Address: 3rd Floor
Alexandra House
307-315 Cowbridge Road East
Cardiff
CF5 1JD
We would like to be added to the Local Government and Housing Committee contacts list in order to receive updates about your work.
Diverse Cymru promotes equality for all. We work across all protected characteristics and with other people who experience discrimination and disadvantage, such as carers and people from lower socio-economic backgrounds. We believe that we can work together to challenge discrimination in all its forms and create an equitable future for the people of Wales.
We believe that equality and human rights should be at the heart of every decision the Senedd makes affecting Wales. Equality, diversity and inclusion must be a cross-cutting theme, central to all inquiries and work of every Senedd committee and policy area.
We would welcome any opportunity to work with you to build commitments to a fair and equal Wales for all into your policies and work as the Local Government and Housing Committee.
A copy of our Manifesto for 2021 is available, in both English and Welsh, here: https://www.diversecymru.org.uk/a-manifesto-for-a-fair-and-equal-wales-2/
What you see as the key priority areas that should be considered during the next 12 months, including the impact of Covid and recovery from the pandemic.
Equality, Diversity and Inclusion
As we recover from Covid-19 it is vital that equality and human rights are placed front and centre of all legislation, strategies, policies, programmes, and actions. The impact on all different communities and groups in Wales must be monitored and action taken to ensure that we emerge from this crisis stronger and more equal, rather than equality and human rights being detrimentally affected. Older, younger, disabled, and Black, Asian and minoritised ethnic people and women are already disproportionately impacted by higher unemployment and lower wages. The current crisis has deepened and highlighted these inequalities.
A ‘one size fits all’ approach will not meet the equalities requirements of people with one or more protected characteristics. We need to recognise and act on the voices and experiences of people in Wales, including intersectional issues. Failure to make this fundamental shift in the way we address equality and diversity will leave many people in Wales at risk of discrimination, poverty and injustice.
Legislation, policy and practice must be co-produced with individuals representing the diversity of the Wales across all characteristics to ensure that it respects every individual and advances equality for all. There is significant evidence that legislative compliance is not reflected in people’s experiences of barriers to accessing services and in discrimination in Wales. This implementation gap must be closed. Effective monitoring and ensuring that the public are directly involved in continually evaluating the effectiveness of steps taken to advance equality and human rights are vital. This is an issues at national, regional and local authority levels in Wales.
The approach and requirements in relation to Equality Impact Assessments must be revised. The current emphasis is all too often on quantitative evidence and minimising negative impacts. Engagement with diverse people is often lacking. The emphasis should be on ensuring maximum positive impact of all legislation, policies, strategies, and actions on the full range of diverse people and advancing equality. Direct and ongoing engagement is a vital aspect of this and requires investment.
Fair and Equal Workplaces
Workplaces must be safe, supportive and inclusive for everyone. This must include addressing the culture of presenteeism and creating a culture where all employees and workers can raise concerns, such as around PPE, without fear of losing working hours or their job.
In-depth equality and diversity training, which includes a programme of specific sessions on the wide range of protected characteristic groups and sub-groups, must be standard practice in all public sector organisations for all staff, including local government. During periods of recession investment in comprehensive equality and diversity training has been cut. This risks overlooking the issues experienced by people with one or more protected characteristics and exacerbating existing inequalities. In-depth and ongoing programmes of equality and diversity training must be seen as essential alongside topics such as health and safety.
Pay gaps must be analysed and addressed by employers, such as Local Authorities, not just in relation to the gender pay gap, but also in relation to the disability and ethnicity pay gaps. Organisations should also regularly review whether there are any pay gaps on other characteristics and take action where these are identified.
Support and training needs to be in place to address under-representation in workplaces, including at more senior levels. More work needs to be done in respect of equalities for older people in work and for training.
Flexible working practices have positive impacts for many disabled people, women, and carers. Disabled people have been calling for flexible working practices for years, and many have been denied. The current crisis has highlighted what is possible. Flexible working practices must become standard practice in the future for all employees. Policies and practices must be reviewed to ensure that they support flexible working and are appropriate for all employees.
Safe and Accessible Communities
Isolation has been a significant impact of the current pandemic on many people. People are shopping, accessing services, and connecting more within their local communities. These local economies and communities are vital. We need to reform the economy and think about localised economies, and cutting down on the need to travel to access work and services, and ensure that local economies are accessible and inclusive for everyone in Wales. This also assists in promoting active travel, tackling climate change and promoting health and wellbeing. Economic policies must support local, neighbourhood shops and services and ensure that all neighbourhoods are accessible for disabled people and inclusive.
Town centres and local neighbourhoods need to be designed in accessible and inclusive ways, for example ensuring that street furniture and features do not present a barrier to disabled people. Public realm design must involve people representing the whole range of protected characteristics and people in Wales from the initial design stage.
Safety and fair treatment on public transport is a concern for many people across the protected characteristics. Public transport staff needs to be trained and aware of equalities issues, including hate incidents, and feeling able to address these issues. There must be comprehensive training for all public transport staff on each protected characteristic group. This must include appropriate and inclusive treatment. Staff must be empowered and supported to challenge when customers experience discrimination or hate incidents on public transport.
All forms of public transport are vital for many older and disabled people as well as people facing socio-economic disadvantage. All forms of public transport must improve accessibility for all disabled people in Wales. This must include audio and visual information, unassisted access, and comprehensive training in access for disabled people, including learning disabled people and people with dementia.
It’s vital to ensure that housing and neighbourhood design address inequalities and meet lifetime homes and neighbourhoods standards.
All housing standards and improvements should fully identify and take into account the requirements, wishes and outcomes for all diverse individuals and communities who experience discrimination and disadvantage in Wales.
Accessible Information
All public information must be written in everyday language as the standard format. This must include using at least 14 pt Sans Serif fonts, sparing use of bold, not using italics or underlining, and never using acronyms. Sector specific terms should also be avoided or explained.
Other accessible formats should be easy to request and quickly provided. This includes large print, Easy Read, audio, Braille, and community languages. This information must be in large print and include ways to request hard copy information by phone, text or post.
All public information should be thoroughly checked for inclusion, to ensure that culturally and religiously inappropriate language or approaches are not used, LGBTQIA+ people are not excluded, and gender and other bias is not present.
All public services in Wales should embed the BDA charter. Legislation should recognise and embrace BSL as an official language. This would place a duty on the public sector to provide services and information in BSL and provide a right to access services in BSL.
All online information and websites should meet the highest web accessibility standards. However, it should also be recognised that no website is fully accessible to everyone. Offline information and support is still required.
These issues apply to both Welsh Government and the Senedd and to Local Authorities.
Representation
Many groups of people are under-represented in politics and in civic society. Positive action should be taken to address under-representation of Black, Asian and minoritised ethnic, disabled, LGBTQIA+, younger people and women in political life and elected office in Wales.
The recommendations from the review of the Diversity in Democracy programme must be fully implemented to address systemic barriers to increasing representation.
Specific mentoring and development schemes for different communities should be funded and delivered by third sector organisations to increase diversity amongst elected members, public appointments, at senior levels in public and private sector organisations, and in civic society.
Public sector organisations should be required to implement positive action schemes to address under-representation in the workforce. This should include management training and mentoring schemes to address under-representation at senior levels.
Electoral reform, including diversity quotas and actions to address under-representation; improving access to running for office; flexibility for members; job shares; and improving accessibility to voting must be progressed as a matter of urgency if any improvements can be implemented for the next Local Authority elections.
All employers should have comprehensive equality and diversity training, including all protected characteristics and sub-groups. This should include unconscious bias training.