The five-year strategy to make York first 'anti-racist city in the North'

Raised in Warrington, Jake has called York home for 14 years after studying counselling at York St John University and deciding to stay. And it’s their “very mixed race” that set Jake down the path they are on.

Jake has helped set up numerous organisations in the city, including York LGBT Forum, York Pride, and Inclusive Equal Rights UK (IERUK), of which they are co-chair with founder Haddy Njie.

IERUK has just launched a five-year strategy to help York achieve the status of the first ‘anti-racist and inclusive city in the North’.

Its vision is to make York a fairer and more equal city for those that live, work or visit, regardless of their background, ability, gender, culture or creed.

Jake’s own experiences with racism drives their work. “Experiencing racism, and homophobia and transphobia as well, I wanted to take that negativity and campaign so others don’t experience it, because it is awful.”

In Warrington, the abuse was physical and violent; it affected their mental health, and they had counselling after being left scared to go outside. In York, it is, they say, “death by a thousand cuts” – “it’s more micro-aggressions, and it’s more structural.”

A motion to become the North’s first anti-racist city, emulating Brighton, and Oxford, was approved by City of York councillors back in October 2021 after being put forward by the chair of IERUK, Haddy Njie.

The working group of IERUK, made up of members of York’s different communities, then identified key areas of concern to develop a plan of action to address institutional racism and unconscious bias, promote cultural diversity and inclusion, and improve access to education and employment opportunities for marginalised groups.

The five-year anti-racism strategy was launched last week, available on the City of York Council and IERUK websites.

Councillor Katie Lomas, City of York Council's executive member for finance, performance, major projects and equalities, says: "We recognise the challenges for organisations across the city of ensuring a genuinely anti-racist environment, and we are happy to restate our commitment to becoming the North's first anti-racist city.

"We would encourage people and businesses across the city to consider how they can support that ambition."

Key initiatives of the strategy include asking public and private sector employers to sign an anti-racist pledge, as well as targeted outreach programs for underrepresented communities, the establishment of a racial equity commission to review city policies, and the implementation of unconscious bias training for all city employees.

The strategy was informed by a research report that IERUK released in February this year: A Snapshot of Racial Disparity in the City of York. Using census data and FOI requests, the statistics they collected focussed on key sectors – health, housing, policing and education.

Jake explains: “Ours is the first report that looks at the data. From that, the five-year strategy offers practical actions for organisations to take, but a theme throughout it is auditing. We’re asking organisations to look at their staff make-up and demographic.”

The campaign group worked with academics from the Institute for Social Justice at York St John University to conduct a qualitative study of people’s interactions with health, education, and policing services. These preliminary findings shared with IERUK have been incorporated into the strategy.

“The data widely documents that racism in York is casual, systemic, and structural,” Haddy says. “It is manifested in many forms that disproportionately and negatively impacts the lives and livelihood of people of colour.”

“There’s a barrier for really skilled people of colour to get to the higher positions in their careers in York,” Jake adds. “Our research shows people of colour who work for organisations, like the council, tend to be in the lower paid positions. In the same way there was a glass ceiling for women, there is one for people of colour.”

It’s not just about tokenism, Jake says, but a wider cultural piece that organisations need to look at.

“York is unique with values of equity and social justice embedded into its fabric, thanks to its history as a Quaker city,” Jake says. “Joseph Rowntree did a lot to address poverty, and the Joseph Rowntree Foundation is renowned for its work around poverty.

" but York has not had that conversation about slavery...We need to look at our institutions and links to slavery, or apartheid, or other regimes where people are being persecuted because of their race.”

One of the proposed actions in the five-year strategy is to explore a deeper study of the city’s image and history in relation to race.

Despite the issues, Jake is keen to champion the city as a place that offers a great quality of life, and one that identifies as an inclusive city.

As its ethnic minority population increased to 14 per cent in 2023, from 12 per cent in 2011, Jake says, now is the time to act, and change. “The majority of people in York want to make sure it’s welcoming for everyone.”