Policy in Practice

Nobody seems to talk about it but the last decade has seen considerable improvements in the lives of Britain’s ethnic minorities. Despite some clear policy failures, such as Windrush, the Conservative government should be very proud of its levelling up agenda and the change in opportunity that all our communities are experiencing. The Black Liver Matters (BLM) protests gave the media a perfect opportunity to focus on those improvements and understand why they happened but instead, they wholly ignored that debate and focused on how the protests unfurled. This missed opportunity is a failure of debate but it’s also an opportunity the Conservatives wasted, therefore until this debate changes, perhaps overshadowed by a second wave of Covid-19, I wanted to lay bare some of the changes we’ve seen in the last decade. Employment In 2004, 73% of 16-64 year olds were in employment. In 2018, that number had risen to 75%. When going by ethnicity, ‘Other than white’ statistics sho...

As the Bristol slaver, Edward Colston fell into the water, the Bristol crowd, which had campaigned for years to get rid of his statue, cheered. Days later, the Mayor of London provided a miracle by getting public sector work done overnight and removed slaver, Robert Milligan from outside the museum of London Docklands. No democratic vote, no conversation, no community engagement; just the removal of a deplorable, visual reminder. In the aftermath, division has arisen and while other statues are being targeted, it’s clear that we now have a few choices to make about these fallen figures. Do we replace them with someone else? Retain public space? Or, use the plinths as a reminder of the past? The choices that are made may influence the length of time it takes to rid ourselves of the maximum amount of racism and inspire sustained change, therefore the decision should not be rushed. However, with websites already being put up that identify other statues that must go, th...