Time for Change: Action Not Words

This is the theme for Black History Month 2022 (BHM) in the UK. This month is something I always feel, at best, ambivalent about. I find most of what I think about the month to be actually rather negative. The obvious questions arise – why should we need a month to remember and celebrate? We should all be celebrating our achievements throughout the year, so why buy into a month that is “granted” by the ‘great and the good’? What exactly are the ‘great and the good’ doing this month to translate their words into action? I could go on, but this would then simply become a cynical rant.

There are many viewpoints about BHM ranging from embracing and celebrating wholeheartedly, to others asking “when is white history month?”. I find Dr Muna Abdi’s take appealing; she tweeted on 07/10/2022, “Our trauma is excavated every October to remind us that we can only exist with permission. I will never see Black History Month as anything more than a distraction. To exist we must live fully in all space, not re-present ourselves as living” (@Muna_Abdi_Phd).

There are lots of organisations who will mark BHM and then revert to their oppressive practices for the remaining eleven months of the year, and think that they did a really good job. It is this kind of performative celebration that troubles me the most.

It has been in excess of two years since the killing of George Floyd. There was, rightly, huge outcry and the black community did much to raise awareness of the importance and equity of black lives, and the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement. I participated in informal debate and discussion, encouraging many white people within my personal and professional circles to increase their awareness and understanding, whilst making it clear it is not my role to educate them (do we all employ a professional chef when we decide it is time we learn how to cook?). I’m pleased to say, within my personal circle, this was greeted positively (I guess that is a reflection of those we choose to surround ourselves with). Professionally, this was not so straightforward, and I took the difficult decision to end longstanding professional relationships when it became very clear that people within the organisation were only ever going to do the “performative” and senior management were comfortable with not addressing this.

Just last week, we saw racist images shared by some police officers via their WhatsApp group, including a particularly horrific (manipulated) image of George Floyd. In September Chris Kaba, a young black man, was shot to death by police in London. Information about his killing is slowly dripping out and it has become clear that, despite initial reporting, he was pursued by an unmarked police car without lights or sirens, and he was not suspected of any crime by the Met at the time of his death. The investigation is ongoing and his family have expressed dismay in relation to the time it is expected to take. As things stand, the officer who killed him has been suspended but no further action has been taken.

So, given the theme is Time for Change: Action not Words, what has changed and how equal is our society really? Moving away from the headlines already discussed, two key issues that impact all of us are income and health care. Recent reports, published with BHM in mind, have highlighted the ongoing inequality in these areas.

In terms of income, research by Glassdoor found that 43% of black workers had experienced pay disparity due to their race, or thought pay inequality existed within their workplace. This contrasts with 57% of white workers who think there is no ethnic pay disparity within their organisations. The research also found that 66% of black workers think their organisations need to take more action to address the ethnicity pay gap, as opposed to only 40% of white workers who think action is needed. If two people are doing the same job then it is surely logical they should receive the same reward. Given that such equity ought to be relatively straightforward to achieve, yet the disparity continues, is it any wonder the more nuanced and difficult to discuss (for some) aspects of racism and inequality remain unchallenged?

The NHS is, we all know, totally underfunded, and has been brought to its knees by successive Tory governments, and Covid. The idea of equality of access remains a central pillar on which the NHS was built. Research published at the beginning of the month by the Black Equity Organisation showed that 65% of black British people reported experiencing racial discrimination from a health professional, and this figure rose to 75% for those aged between 18-34. In 2020 the British Medical Journal found black women were four times more likely to die in childbirth than white women in the UK. They found that over two years, 34 black women died in every 100,000 giving birth, compared to 8 white women in every 100,000. This research received much publicity at the time, and it remains to be seen what will change as a consequence.

Research conducted by the University of Exeter and The Guardian has also found worrying racial disparities in cancer care. Analysis of 126, 000 cancer patients over 10 years found the average waiting time for a white person from first presentation of symptoms to diagnosis was 55 days, for Asian people it was 60 days, and for black people, 61 days, showing black and Asian people waited 9 and 11% longer respectively. The potential long term implications of such disparity for the patient and their family needs no further explanation.

It could be argued that BHM is not about addressing and overcoming the kinds of deep seated inequalities that contribute to the income and health issues outlined above, but about raising awareness and celebrating achievements. In my view, the issues I have touched on in this blog are simply the tip of the iceberg. The death of the Queen and all the links to colonialism that were apparent during the funeral open up a whole other debate about how far we have or haven’t travelled in our quest for equality and, again, many remain very uncomfortable having those discussions. Surely any discomfiture when thinking about equality has to be named and set aside in order for real change to occur. Until then, I think, BHM is likely to be simply an annual month of words with little subsequent life changing action.

References

Black Equity Organisation, “Systemic Change Required”, 2022

Lilian Anekwe “Ethnic disparities in maternal care”, British Medical Journal, 2020

Martins T, Abel G, Ukoumunne O C, Price S, Lyratzopoulos G, Chinegwundoh F, & Hamilton W, “Assessing Ethnic Inequalities in Diagnostic Interval of Common Cancers: A Population-Based UK Cohort Study”, Cancers 2022