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3 years ago

Boris Johnson news – live: Race report experts ‘never consulted’ as Doreen Lawrence says findings fuel racism

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Jane Dalton,Vincent Wood,Chantal da Silva
Thursday 01 April 2021 13:06 EDT
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Boris Johnson reacts to resignation of aide in wake of race disparities report

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Two authors identified as stakeholders in a landmark report on race disparities in Britain are objecting to being listed as providing evidence for it, with one protesting: “I was never consulted”.

S I Martin said: ““I just would not have agreed to have been consulted even if I had been asked, but I’ve not been asked.” Meanwhile, Stephen Bourne toldThe Independent he felt “manipulated”.

The government has since said it will remove Mr MArtin’s name from the report, but defended inclusion of Mr Bourne as he had “participated in a 10 Downing Street event for Black History Month”.

The government is facing major backlash over the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities’ report, which concluded that Britain was no longer a country where the system is deliberately rigged against ethnic minorities.

Doreen Lawrence, who has dedicated nearly two decades to demanding justice after her son Stephen was murdered in a racist attack, has said the report gives “racists the green light”.

Amid the row, Boris Johnson’s most senior Black adviser is expected to resign from his role next month after previously describing tensions within government as “unbearable”.

Downing Street sources have rejected the suggestion that Samuel Kasumu’s resignation was linked to the report.

Meanwhile the government is facing legal action over links between personal protective equipment and alleged modern slavery.

Wilson Solicitors, a London firm, has written to the DHSC raising concerns over how gloves made by Malaysian manufacturers with a history of exploiting workers have been provided to frontline healthcare staff.

3 years ago

Alex Salmond claims Sturgeon will ‘work’ with Alba Party after initial ‘upset’ over its creation

Alex Salmond has claimed that Nicola Sturgeon will work with his pro-Scottish independence Alba party and others who support a second referendum on the matter.

Mr Salmond said the SNP leader has indicated she will work with his party after a week of being “upset” over its creation.

Adam Forrest reports:

Salmond claims Sturgeon would ‘work’ with Alba once she stops being ‘upset’

Salmond says Sturgeon ‘did concede you have to work with people’ in independence cause

Chantal Da Silva1 April 2021 10:10
3 years ago

New health security agency to help prevent threat of future pandemics

The UK is expected to formally establish a new health security agency that will be tasked with planning, preventing and responding to external threats to health.

In a Twitter statement, Health Secretary Matt Hancock said the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) would serve as the country’s “permanent standing capacity” to deal with potential health threats, including future pandemics.

Mr Hancock also congratulated Dr Jenny Harries, England’s deputy chief medical officer, who is expected to lead the UKHSA.

Chantal Da Silva1 April 2021 10:17
3 years ago

Skills minister says Kasumu’s resignation is ‘personal matter’ after acknowledging she does not ‘know who he is’

Skills minister Gillian Keegan has said she cannot comment on reports that Boris Johnson’s most senior Black adviser, Samuel Kasumu, has resigned because it is a “personal matter”.

“It’s a personal matter. When somebody resigns, it’s a personal matter,” she told ITV’s Good Morning Britain.

“I can’t defend or talk about why he has resigned, it is a personal matter. It’s a matter for him.”

Earlier in the day, Ms Keegan had also said that she could not comment on the matter because she did not know who Mr Kasumu is.

Speaking on Times Radio, Ms Keegan said she could not confirm Mr Kasumu’s reported plans to depart No 10, saying: “I don’t even know who he is,” according to PA.

Chantal Da Silva1 April 2021 10:27
3 years ago

Skills minister says people should not 'pit groups against groups' following race report

Skills minister Gillian Keegan has said that people should not “pit groups against groups” following backlash to a controversial report from the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities.

Asked about comments made by MP David Lammy, who said Black Britons were being “gaslighted” by the report, Ms Keegan said: “There’s a lot of work being done on this, it’s really important to not pit groups against groups.”

“I looked at the report ... people from ethnic minorities have also come up with this report, so clearly there isn’t a single view,” she said, according to PA.

While Ms Keegan said it was important not to drive division, some have accused the report of doing just that, with, Labour shadow equalities secretary Marsha de Cordova branding the release a “divisive polemic which cherry-picks statistics”.

“This report was an opportunity to seriously engage with the reality of inequality and institutional racism in the UK. Instead we have a divisive polemic which cherry-picks statistics,” Ms de Cordova said. “To downplay institutional racism in a pandemic where black, Asian and ethnic minority people have died disproportionately and are now twice as likely to be unemployed is an insult.”

The shadow equalities secretary further accused the report of glorifying the slave trade, with Ms Cordova asserting: “The government must urgently explain how they came to publish content which glorifies the slave trade and immediately disassociate themselves with these remarks.”

Ms Keegan said she felt “one of the most interesting and important things in the report” was to break down the BAME label “so we can actually get to the individual differences and disparities and inequalities that different people face so we can solve them”.

Chantal Da Silva1 April 2021 10:44
3 years ago

Lord Woolley says timing of Kasumu resignation unlikely to be ‘coincidence’

Former equality and human rights commissioner Lord Simon Woolley has said he believes it is unlikely that the timing of reports of Samuel Kasumu, Boris Johnson’s most senior Black adviser, stepping down is a “coincidence”.

Reports of Mr Kasumu’s plans to step down from his role came on the heels of a widely condemned report from the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities, which concluded that structural racism is no longer an issue in the UK.

“I haven’t spoken to Samuel before this and he was disheartened, that’s why he threatened to resign before. I don’t think it’s any coincidence. I haven’t spoken to him in several days,” Lord Woolley said, speaking on BBC News. “All I know is this – there’s a crisis at Number 10 when it comes to acknowledging and dealing with a systematic race inequality and they must confront it.”

Lord Woolley said Mr Kasumu “would have seen the report. He would have felt the temperature of Black Britons to this report, that they are incandescent with rage that their lived experiences, the trauma of what’s happened in the past year with Covid-19 and its impact has been trounced upon and denied”.

“If I know Samuel, he’s upset by it,” he said.

Lord Woolley also expressed his dismay over the report itself, branding it “divisive” and a “missed” opportunity.

Chantal Da Silva1 April 2021 10:52
3 years ago

Race report authors were ‘handpicked to follow a narrative', Lord Woolley says

The authors behind the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities’ report were “handpicked to follow a narrative”, former equality and human rights commissioner Lord Simon Woolley has said.

Speaking on BBC News, Lord Woolley condemned the report, which concluded that structural racism is not an issue in the UK, calling it a “missed opportunity”.

“We had an opportunity to not just build back better, but to build new better, to have a framework to tackle deep-seated racial inequality. We’ve missed it,” he said.

Questioned on the fact that “most of the people on the commission are people of colour,” Lord Woolley said: “Of course. They’re handpicked to follow a narrative”.

“You have to bear in mind that when this commission begun the framework was set in stone,” he said.

Lord Woolley asserted that when the commission was first created, it was done so with the goal of changing the “narrative” around racism to “stop the masterclass victimhood”.

“These people were chosen because they bought into that idea,” he said of the authors behind the report.

Lord Woolley said the right way to “change the narrative” is not by denying the existence of structural racism, but by “changing the systems”.

Chantal Da Silva1 April 2021 11:16
3 years ago

Claims race report ‘downplayed evil’ of slave trade is ‘absurd’, commission chair says

The chairman of the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities has dismissed accusations that the group’s report on racial disparities in the UK sought to put a “positive spin on slavery and empire” and downplayed the “evil of the slave trade”.

In statement on Thursday Dr Tony Sewell: “It is absurd to suggest that the commission is trying to downplay the evil of the slave trade.”

has dismissed accusations that accusations of having sought to put a “positive spin on slavery and empire” with a controversial report on racial disparities in the UK.

“It is both ridiculous and offensive to each and every commissioner,” he said.

“The report merely says that, in the face of the inhumanity of slavery, African people preserved their humanity and culture,” he said.

In the report’s foreward, Dr Sewell had proposed a “A Making Of Modern Britain” teaching resource, which he said was suggested as a response to “negative calls for ‘decolonising’ the curriculum”.

The resource, he said would look at how “Britishness influenced the Commonwealth” and how local communities have influenced “modern Britain”.

He further wrote that “there is a new story about the Caribbean experience which speaks to the slave period not only being about profit and suffering but how culturally African people transformed themselves into a remodelled African/Britain,” a claim that sparked outcry.

Labour’s shadow women and equalities secretary Marsha de Cordova branded it “one of the worst bits” of the report and said it had put “a positive spin on slavery and empire”.

Chantal Da Silva1 April 2021 11:55
3 years ago

Boris Johnson says there are ‘serious issues’ of racism society must face

Boris Johnsonhas said there are “serious issues that our society faces to do with racism” amid backlash over a report on racial inequalities in the UK.

Asked about the racial disparity report, the PM told reporters during a visit to Middlesbrough: “Look, this is a very interesting piece of work.

“I don’t say the Government is going to agree with absolutely everything in it, but it has some original and stimulating work in it that I think people need to read and to consider,” he said, according to PA.

“There are very serious issues that our society faces to do with racism that we need to address,” the prime minister asserted.

“We’ve got to do more to fix it, we need to understand the severity of the problem, and we’re going to be looking at all the ideas that they have put forward, and we’ll be making our response.”

Chantal Da Silva1 April 2021 12:20
3 years ago

Boris Johnson ‘very hopeful’ Liberty Steel jobs can be saved

Boris Johnson has said he is “very hopeful” that jobs at Liberty Steel plants in the UK can be saved after it came to light that the company owns “many billions” to a collapsed financial backer.

Speaking during a visit to Middlesbrough, the prime minister said Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng was in “daily contact” with the firm’s owners in a bid to hash out a solution.

“I think British steel is a very important national asset. I think the fact that we make steel in this country is of strategic long-term importance,” he said.

“We have learned during the pandemic that it is not a good idea to be excessively reliant in times of trouble on imports of critical things.”

The prime minister said the UK needs a “strong steel industry” and said he was “very hopeful that we will get a solution”.

“It would be crazy if we were not to use this post-Brexit moment not to use the flexibility we have to buy British steel. So that’s want we want to do,” he said.

Liberty Steel boss Sanjeev Gupta had revealed that the company owed “many billions” to Greensill Capital but has said that none of the firm’s plants will shut down “under my watch”.

Chantal Da Silva1 April 2021 12:30
3 years ago

Experts identified in race report ‘shocked’ to see names on contributor list

Two authors named as “stakeholders” in a landmark report on race disparities in Britain have hit out at claims they provided evidence, with one protesting: “I was never consulted”. Report by Ashley Cowburn and Bethany Dawson:

Experts named in government’s ‘flawed’ race report ‘shocked’ to see names in evidence contributor list

Exclusive: ‘I was never consulted, I don’t know what record they have of contacting me’

Jane Dalton1 April 2021 12:37

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