- Conference
- 2014 Community Service Group Conference
- Date
- 8 November 2013
- Decision
- Carried
The current government’s austerity measures continue to have a disproportionate impact on Black communities and the Black voluntary and community sector. Research in 2010 on the ‘Voice for Change’ website found that 45% of community organisations providing services specifically for Black communities experienced cuts to funding.
This unprecedented threat to the survival of Black community organisations is coming at a time when they are needed the most and facing increasing demand on their services.
For Black people in the UK this inequality manifests itself in higher rates of unemployment that see 50% of young Black people unemployed, higher rates of child poverty, poorer educational outcomes and an over-representation of Black people in the criminal justice system compared to white people.
Experience has shown that community services increase civic engagement and reduce isolation. Many advocacy services provide support for people when they have nowhere else to go. In the Black community there have been measurable outcomes of success for community sector intervention particularly in educational attainment.
Research by the Afya trust in 2012 found that 20% of Local authorities did not conduct an Equality Impact Assessment to look at how the service changes or changes to funding could disproportionately impact on any particular group and how they might mitigate against this. If this continues; for communities it will mean an increase in inequalities. For Black staff working in this sector who often work alone and have committed their time and expertise to delivering a service for some of societies most vulnerable people experiencing disadvantage, discrimination and exclusion it will mean further redundancies and challenges to pay, terms and conditions.
This is why conference asks the community service group executive to work with the NEC and the NBMC to seek to:
i) Highlight when cuts to community and voluntary services disproportionately impact on Black communities
ii) Support members in Black community and voluntary organisations who face cuts to terms and conditions and redundancy
iii) Work with Local Government Service Group to encourage and support branches and regions to ensure that local authorities conduct Equality Impact Assessments when making proposals to cut funding to or make changes to services for organisations providing services for Black communities
iv) Develop a network of Black activists and members in the sector to support isolated workers to engage in UNISON by holding a network day with the support of the NBMC. This should look at recruitment of Black members and their priority negotiation issues
v) Produce a briefing on effective community campaigning strategies to campaign against cuts Black voluntary and community organisations