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| 31/10/2008 |
Hamilton Abuse Adds Impetus to UNISON Call to Clamp Down on Racism at Work |
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THE sick racist attack on British Grand Prix ace Lewis Hamilton has added fresh impetus to a top trade union's call to step up the fight against discrimination.
UNISON's North West region, based in Manchester, has been test-driving an ambitious new scheme to clamp down on racism in the workplace. The programme is about to be rolled out nationwide.
Regional Secretary Frank Hont is a leading advocate of UNISON campaigns to combat racism and has been an active member of a number of community cohesion initiatives since the North West disturbances in 2001.
He said the abuse levelled at Hamilton on a Spanish website ahead of Sunday's Brazillian Grand Prix title decider is a high profile example of why campaigns against racism are vital.
He said: "The North West region has been fine-tuning a pilot training programme called Challenging Racism in the Workplace that is being introduced across the union's 12 regions from October.
"We involved 15 branches with experience of race issues in the workplace in two phases of the pilot and engaged black members in developing solutions to the problems.
"Our aim is to ensure employers actively fight racism and promote equality, rather than merely react to discrimination. Many managers have produced race equality schemes but few monitor their policies or conduct impact assessments.
"We want to make sure race equality policies are more than merely paper exercises and intend to hold employers to account if they don't comply with the law."
Regions will work with local project teams to oversee how the scheme progresses in local workplaces for at least a year.
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CONTACT DETAILS
• To find out more about membership benefits contact our helpline, UNISONdirect on 0845 355 0845. Lines are open 6am-midnight Mon to Fri and 9am-4pm Sat.
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