Where’s the diversity?
Equalities May 21 2018BT urgently needs to step up its efforts to step up recruitment from black and minority ethic (BAME) communities so it becomes more reflective of the communities it operates in.
That was the unanimous verdict from delegates at the CWU’s Telecoms & Financial Services Conference in April in response to an impassioned plea by Eddie Beese of Great Western branch for the union to “campaign vigorously” to ensure that the company’s recruitment policies reach out to the BAME community.
Insisting the diversity deficit was stark at his Bristol workplace, Eddie told Conference: “Every day when I go through the security office I leave diversity behind. It hits you it’s a different world – it’s like going into Dr Who’s tardis and being transported back in time to the 1960s and 70s.
“You walk into the yard and see the engineers – all predominantly white men. I see the apprentices – all predominantly white young men. I go into the Openreach Centre of Excellence and, guess what, the workforce is all white.
“When I leave work in the evening I step back out the tardis and am transported back to 2018 and am surrounded by diversity again.”
Eddie continued: “BT’s advertising and publicity portrays a company that is diverse…but it’s a fact that its recruitment policy is flawed and not reaching out to the BAME community. It seems to me that existing employees’ referring a friend or family member is only producing more of the same – the next generation of a predominantly white workforce.
“BT can move work to India in a couple of weeks or months, but in the past few years it hasn’t to my knowledge offered or advertised jobs in the Indian community in Bristol. We need to tell them to adopt new recruitment policies and only then will we see a BT that is truly reflective of the demographics of the population it operates in.”
Supporting the motion, Winston Richards of Greater London Combined said he was “sad but not surprised” to hear of the situation in Bristol. “This is something that’s going on not just in BT, but in other organisations nationally,” he stressed.
“It’s something we need to address, because when you’re dealing with the private sector there is no statutory requirement for them to have a certain amount of people from a certain background – and because of that when they are recruiting there is an element of unconscious bias.”
Suggesting that the company could easily get in touch with local community groups and reconsider where job vacancies are advertised, Winston argued that “positive action does have a role to play, especially where you identify areas where there are deficiencies.”
Bill Martin of Leicester & Midshires branch agreed, citing a pointed lack of diversity he’d spotted himself amongst new Openreach recruits going through induction sessions at Yarnfield Park.
“I personally have a problem with the term ‘positive discrimination’ because it seems to me that’s discrimination in another guise – but targeted recruiting is a completely different aspect,” he insisted.
Dan Lewis of Bootle Financial Services added: “Let’s be honest about what’s going on – we know companies advertise things in certain areas because they know they get certain audiences. We need to be vigorous about this, be blatant and rock that damn boat!”
Supporting the motion on behalf of the T&FS Executive, Ken Woolley insisted the CWU was already on the case. “We’ve raised concerns on numerous occasions and both BT and Openreach accept they need to do a lot better,” Ken told Conference.
“It’s not just about BAME – they’re also trying to get female recruitment up as well, especially in Openreach.”