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Robert SugdenRob leads the delivery of HACT’s work focused on the role of housing in communities and neighbourhoods, including the Centre for E ...more
How the sector has been marking Black History Month
A HACT working group involving several social landlords has been putting together events for Black History Month. Rob Sugden explains what they have been doing, and why
Never before has Black History Month felt more vital, or more important, than it does this year.
The events of the summer – from the death of George Floyd in the US and the Black Lives Matter movement, to the COVID-19 pandemic and its disproportionate impact on Black, Asian and ethnic minority communities – have made the lived realities of, and continued discrimination against, many Black people in the UK impossible to ignore any longer.
Institutions and companies everywhere have responded by pledging to make real change. As social housing organisations rooted in diverse and vibrant communities, we have an important role to play, too – one that goes beyond simple words of support.
“There has been a significant expansion in the range of activities offered this year, both for residents and staff, despite the difficulties of navigating events in a socially distanced way”
That’s why to mark this year’s Black History Month, HACT’s Centre for Excellence in Community Investment formed a cross-sector working group, to keep these difficult but necessary conversations about the role race plays within society and our own organisations going.
As the working group’s recently published statement about Black History Month outlines, there are significant issues that institutions and the wider sector still need to address, and we can do so only by coming together.
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Members of the working group have spoken about the varied ways in which their organisations have been commemorating this year’s Black History Month. There has been a significant expansion in the range of activities offered this year, both for residents and staff, despite the difficulties of navigating events in a socially distanced way.
Phoenix Community Housing, a resident-led association based in South East London, would normally organise a big event called Diversity Day in its main office and community building, The Green Man.
This year, because of COVID-19, the association has moved Diversity Day and Black History Month online, where it will be hosting two workshops and a discussion panel. The first workshop is about how to become an inventor and highlights Black inventors throughout history, and the second is an African printed face mask class.
The panel discussion, which will be open to staff and residents, will ask the question: what is community?
Prior to the panel event, Phoenix will also be putting out lots of information to staff internally, such as questionnaires about Black history and why it’s important, to incite debate and conversation.
Yvonne Phillip is community engagement officer at Phoenix Community Housing. She says: “Black Lives Matter and its fall-out around the world has raised the profile of Black History Month and highlighted it to a wider audience. Because people are now listening it’s a great time to get Black history into our communities.”
“All of these sessions and events aim to encourage colleagues to dig deeper, look closer and think bigger”
Yvonne has found the Black History Month working group particularly useful in this regard. “It’s been really refreshing to see other Black faces around the table within the housing sector. I’m hoping that this working group continues and it’s not just about Black History Month. We need to continue it in terms of minority groups within housing,” she says.
Organisations such as Catalyst and Peabody are celebrating Black history and culture across the world and in the UK by hosting webinar events with prominent speakers. Peabody recently ran a well-attended webinar for staff featuring Cherron Inko-Tariah MBE, where she charted her journey as a senior Black professional in the UK.
Guest speaker Paul Anderson-Walsh delivered a thought-provoking session for Peabody earlier this month on the impact of structural inequality on well-being, and guest speaker Patrick Vernon OBE, who will spotlight civil rights leaders in the UK, will close Peabody’s month of events.
At Catalyst, talks this month range from sharing personal histories and stories of speakers from different backgrounds and industries, to academic discussions on intersectionality, diversity, and Black history, poetry and spoken word sessions.
In a change from last year, Catalyst is also running confidential listening sessions aimed at finding out how it can better support its colleagues. Catalyst has also organised an online community project from the Unity Centre in Brent.
All of these sessions and events aim to encourage colleagues to dig deeper, look closer and think bigger. Yet as well as events tied to the month, Catalyst is using this year’s Black History Month celebrations to encourage positive change across the organisation on equality and diversity.
It will review training to ensure that there are no issues with reinforcing stereotypes, develop a learning library for colleagues to cover diversity and inclusion key topics, and launch a ‘Colleague Working Group’ and a ‘Networks and Shadow Board’ to increase diverse representation.
The team at Sovereign similarly recognises that Black history goes far beyond the month. This year it has launched a new employee network called the Caribbean African Asian Network (CAAN), for people who represent those ethnicities but also all minority groups and ethnicities.
On an internal Facebook page, it has been posting daily facts about famous Black people throughout history, providing education pieces to employees on topics such as intersectionality, and has changed its logo for October to reflect the colours of Black History Month.
Jerome Williams, equality, diversity and inclusion lead at Sovereign, says: “This year we have done more than ever before to mark Black History Month. In previous years Black History Month at Sovereign was always employee-led. Although employees are still key to what we have been doing, this year our involvement has been led from the very top.
“As an organisation we recognise the importance of race and ethnicity within our workplace and we’re working hard to support the needs of our colleagues and to make our organisation more diverse and inclusive.”
At Clarion, this year’s Black History Month is also much bigger. Last year it had three events across the whole month; this year it has three per week, for staff and members of Clarion’s internal BAME network.
The line-up at these events features guest speakers from a range of backgrounds, such as a Black historian and African fashion designer, safe space Fridays, an employment webinar from Clarion’s HR team that will share insights about the recruitment process, and a meditation session.
“Clarion has launched a campaign called ‘stories of ancestry’, which invites people to talk about where they were born, where they’re from, and anything that makes them feel positive about their heritage”
Clarion has also partnered with BAME Recruitment, which focuses on getting ethnic minorities into more senior leadership positions, as well as the Housing Diversity Network, which is running a racial awareness class for Clarion’s BAME network and several webinar events throughout the month.
On top of this, Clarion has launched a campaign called ‘stories of ancestry’, which invites people to talk about where they were born, where they’re from, and anything that makes them feel positive about their heritage. Although Clarion’s BAME network is for staff internally, Clarion hopes to get the resident involvement and community investment teams involved off the back of the network’s events.
Speaking about the increased focus that Black Lives Matter has brought to this month, Alozie Ohuonu, co-chair of Clarion’s BAME network, says: “It’s allowed resources to be freed up for things that the network have been asking for for quite a long time. I hope that off the back of this it’ll just continue.”
Rob Sugden, head of communities, HACT
The group will be hosting an event entitled Black History Month: What next? in mid-November to discuss how the sector can take forward some of the work, ideas and discussions that have emerged over the course of Black History Month. For more information, please contact Adam Chester at adam.chester@hact.org.uk
21.10.2020 9.26am UPDATE
This article has been updated to reflect a change in the date on which HACT is running an event about Black History Month. Originally it was stated to run in October, this has changed to November.
23.10.2020 4.55pm UPDATE
This article has been updated to correct the spelling of Alozie Ohuonu’s name.
