Page 18 - link magazine

18 The Link Magazine • July 2003
Race relations in Swindon 35 years on
Swindon Racial Equality Council (SREC) celebrates a big anniversary in July. Director Jaginder Bassi looks back.
Swindon has changed enormously over the last 35 years. It has seen some major changes from a railway town to a mixed economy. Yet racial
discrimination has continued and many institutions have failed to deliver on racial equality.
Swindon REC began its work in Jaginder Bas jd'rector, Schemes. These agencies include
s
1967 and it was reported at the WHAT WAS WORSE' Swindon Council, Police, Swindon
second from left, with
time that 'it will probably have a i-e'e ? ff?es, Angela THIS ADVERT College, Probation Service and the
short life - everyone expects that.' McDo.iiallt, receptionist, OR YOUR Fire Service.
How wrong we were. Over the Tony Hagger, employmen t FAILURE TO COMPLAIN? SREC's current work indicates
years, SREC has played a vital role officer, Margaret Pearce, that racism, marginalisation and
in raising awareness of racial dis- I acting office manager exclusion are experienced on a
crimination and the need to tackle daily basis by individuals and
it has operated in a hostile envi- groups. There is ample anecdotal
ronment. WHAT WAS WORSE" evidence which shows that Black
It has gone through three peri- THIS ADVERT Minority Ethnic communities are
ods of varying strategic emphasis: R YOUR not engaging with key decision
1967-1981 when language barriers !t PRE TO COMPLAIN? and policy makers.
were identified as an obstacle to Much of our work with ethnic
social integration; 1982-1990 when minority groups tends to be infor-
SREC focused on campaigning for mal, through networking, rather
equality; 1991-2003, where the than structured arrangements. Our
work has shifted to promoting ra- from East Africa, Vietnamese, Chi- meet their needs. formal partnerships are estab-
cial equality and equal opportuni- nese, and Irish. Some of the key race equality lished via the Race Coalition which
ties and supporting individuals There is a growing community factors are the low ethnic minority was set up by Swindon Council to
with legal remedies. from Goa, Somalia and refugees representation in the workforce of consult with black and ethnic mi-
The Race Relations (Amend- and asylum seekers from other large public sector agencies. For nority groups, the Crime & Disor-
ment) Act provides a regulatory parts of the world. According to example, last year, we supported der Strategic Board of which SREC
framework for promoting racial the 2001 census, ethnic minorities 35 cases of racial discrimination. is a member, the Race Hate Forum,
equality and provides a new op- form 8.5% of the local population, There has also been a 110 per the Police's Equality Forum and
portunity for organisations to stop slightly below the national aver- cent increase in reported racist in- the Ethnic Minority Liaison Group.
and assess their racial equality age. Because of the relative small- cidents last year and from April Also we are members of the Com-
policies and practices. ness of the ethnic minority com- 2002 - September 2002, there were munity Legal Services Partnership.
Swindon has a population of munity, the problems they face go 122 incidents reported to Swindon There is a perception that we
about 180,000 and ethnic minority largely unrecognised. Much of our Police. only serve the interests of black
groups include the Polish, work, therefore, is centred on sen- We work with other agencies on and Asian people but this is not
Punjabis, Jamaicans, Pakistanis, sitizing organizations such as the issues to ensure that the needs of true. In fact we are here for anyone
Italians, Bangladeshis, and Asians council, the police and schools to ethnic minority communities are who has experienced racial dis-
considered and planned for. We crimination and harassment, black
provide regular surgeries on im- and white. We are here for the
migration/nationality matters at whole of our community.
Millen Advice Point. We are cur- Swindon has come a along way
tt'OifA itt rently involved in giving advice to in terms of race relations but there
public sector agencies on their poli- is no room for complacency.
cies and procedures for imple- We can be contacted on 528545,
menting their Race Equality mail: [email protected]

Meetings for minority group
YOUR LOCAL PVC-U MANUFACTURER
Weekly support and social meetings for elderly and disabled people
and their carers have been launched at the Link Centre, thanks to a
• Buy direct from grant from the lottery funded Community Innovators Millenium
our factory Awards Scheme.
Salas Khan and Syed Naqvi made the bid to trial a nine month pilot
• We make it and
project for Swindon's Pakistan Welfare Association.
we fit it Mr Khan said, "this is the first time the welfare association has run a
• High security project which brings elderly and disabled people in our community
together for activities like cultural arts and crafts, naat programmes
• 10 year guarantee (cultural poetry), telling stories and group games.
Syed Naqvi and Salas Khan hold up the lottery grant award letter
• Lowest prices
with members of the support group
Why not let
us handle
everything

from start to
finish?

Call today 01793 790944
or 07973 232435 (evenings and weekends)
The Marsh, Lower Wanborough. SN4 OAS