From February 2021 to November 2021 the Centre on the Dynamics of Ethnicity (CODE) began conducting the “largest and most comprehensive” surveying of the day-to-day living of Black and Minoritised people during the early wave of the COVID-19 Pandemic (CODE 2023). Sampling over 14,000 individuals, roughly 68% of whom belong to a Minoritised religious or ethnic community, this two-year research project concluded that “Britain is not close to being a racially just society.” (The Guardian 2023) Its primary finding concluded that more than a third of Black and Minoritised individuals have experienced a type of racially-motivated abuse – whether physical, verbal, or otherwise. It has further concluded:

Almost one in six Black and Minoritised people had racially motivated abuse before the onset of the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Chinese and Asian ethnic groups also experienced a rise in abuse during and throughout the COVID-19 Pandemic.
More than a quarter of all respondents have experienced some sort of racial insult.
The aforementioned statistics of racial discrimination are pervasive throughout society, with a high prevalence of inequality of outcomes presents even in education, the workplace, housing, and interactions with the police.
In spite of the discrimination and inequality, the vast majority of surveyed Black and Minoritised respondents reported a “strong sense of belonging” to British society, which sits alongside a deep attachment to their ethnic origins.

Black South West Network’s (BSWN) own research supports the conclusions made by the research lead, Professor Nissa Finney of the University of St Andrews, in stating that racism is “part of the daily lives” of Black and Minoritised people in the UK. Certainly, BSWN recognises that the United Kingdom has many steps to take before it is a racially just society. CODE’s Evidence for Equality National Survey (EVENS) report, juxtaposed against previous reports on Racial Inequality, is unabashed in its claim that racism extends past singular, isolated instances of individual choice. The report directly positions its findings against the findings of the government’s ‘Sewell Report on Racial Disparities’ which santised the impact of structural and institutional racism in the United Kingdom. BSWN’s own statement on the Sewell Report supports these conclusions drawn.

The EVENS report also shines a light on the discriminatory issues faced by the Gypsy, Roma, and Traveller communities, with Friends, Families & Travellers praising it for its “largest ever participation of Gypsy, Roma, and Traveller community members”, a transformative community participation that sheds a light on the stark inequalities faced by travelling communities.

The Impact of the Pandemic on Racial Discrimination

CODE’s EVENS report has uncovered, along with the rise of racist abuse against Asian and Chinese ethnic groups, that ethnic minority groups were more likely to have experienced bereavement stemming from a COVID-19 complication than white British people. Indeed, BSWN’s report: ‘Impact of COVID-19 on BAME Led Businesses, Organisations & Communities’ by Chiara Lodi (Senior Research Officer) found that, out of the sampled groups of Black and Minoritised VCSE organisations, 92%... expect the community needs they serve to increase due to COVID-19.” (Lodi 2020). The impact of the Pandemic is also exemplified by the finding that “90%... [of] business owners who responded to the survey indicated that they have already lost a significant amount of income” with a further 67% of BAME businesses surveyed having had to close their businesses due to the” pandemic’s direct influence.

Housing

BSWN’s Housing Strand of Policy & Research has uncovered stark inequalities in the housing sector when it came to Black & Minoritised participation. The Housing BAME Communities in Bristol (A Community-Led Initiative) 2020 (Retief & Lodi 2020) reports that the issue of overcrowding is “predominant in Somali Households” (at 63%). It further notes that “multiple intersectional dynamics [came] into play…” Moreover, the issue of ‘dampness and condensation’ appears generally more often in African Caribbean households, at 43% of the surveyed group and around a “quarter of the study’s sample has either been evicted, been threatened with eviction, or failed to request repairs for fear of eviction.”

BSWN’s report also states: Of the sample, 95% consisted of racialised individuals – “42% of the research’s survey respondents indicated experiencing emergency needs at least once, the most common being ‘sofa surfing’ (20%) and ‘being threatened with eviction’ (12%), followed by ‘sleeping rough’, ‘being evicted’ (7%), and ‘not requesting repairs due to the fear of eviction’ (6%).” The EVENS report corroborates BSWN’s findings. The Guardian review of the EVENS report noted that “ethnic minority groups were more likely to live in overcrowded housing – 60% of Roma families were overcrowded and a quarter of Pakistani and Arab people – and far more likely than white British people to be without access to outdoor space at home.” (Butler 2023). Even more insidiously, the EVENS report also found that 17% of surveyed respondents have claimed that their property had previously been damaged by “racist attacks.”

Education

Whilst the report failed to complete the surveying of a representative sample of under-age Black and Minoritised individuals, it states – as equally forcefully – that this could mean that the findings made by the EVENS report understate the extent of ethnic inequality in Britain. BSWN’s report on the ‘Impact of the Cost-of-Living Crisis on Black and Minoritised Communities in the South West’ (Monzon 2023) investigated the hardships experienced by Black and Minoritised families due to the Cost-of-Living crisis. The report found that of the 133 respondents, 22 stated they had a family. Of these respondents – mostly mothers – their main concerns were on the cost of education, such as tuition fees, transportation costs, uniforms, and stationary/sports equipment. A staggering amount of these families, 86%, identified themselves as Black, with a further 45% of these Black respondents identifying themselves as Somali.

Concluding Remarks

This report, as many preceding it, has presented an opportunity to grapple with the issue of racial inequality throughout the United Kingdom. What sets it apart is its explicit reference to issues of systemic and institutional racism, its deliberate inclusion of the Gypsy, Roma, and Traveller communities, and the surveying of its participants’ political participation. Indeed, it does not attempt to downplay the breadth of racial inequality; in fact, the report identifies its own gaps and its impact on failing to fully grapple with the pervasiveness of racial inequality in all parts of society. In doing so, the report makes space for further discovery of racial inequality without detrimentally impacting the findings made by other Black and Minority-led community organisations.

Further Comments

The EVENS report is available in 14 different languages and was contributed by the following organisations: NHS Race and Health Observatory, Operation Black Vote, Muslim Council of Britain, The Ubele Initiative, the Stuart Hall Foundation, EYST (Wales), Migrants’ Rights Network, BEMIS (Scotland), the Race Equality Foundation, the Runnymede Trust, Friends, Family & Travellers, and Business in the Community.