Report revealed into racism grievances at Dudley Council

Following an independent investigation into Dudley Council, a report has found ethnic minority employees were twice as likely to have experienced bullying or discrimination from a manager in the last two years, and three times more likely to say they had been bullied by a colleague.

Black, Asian and ethnic minority employees were also twice more likely than white employees to face disciplinary action and of those disciplinaries, nearly a third resulted in them having no case to answer.

The report by the Birmingham Race Action Partnership was made available to the council on the 15th December, but union’s UNITE and Unison only received the report on the 13th, one day before a meeting scheduled by the council to discuss an action plan to address the issues identified in the report.

Therefore, both Unite and Unison say they did not attend the meeting and asked that it be rescheduled due to the lack of time to consider the report fully.

The council refused and went ahead with the meeting with trade union GMB who were not a signatory to the grievance that triggered the investigation. GMB were unable to support the original grievance on the basis that the issue didn’t affect any of their members.

Theresa Kelly, branch secretary of Unison, blamed the council for delaying the release of the report so it could “polish its equality and diversity credentials”.

Council figures showed that of the 4,797 people who worked at the local authority in 2020, 11.9% identified as black, Asian, and other ethnic minority workers.

In the report, comments from participants described “bullying and intimidation through emails, face-to-face, telephone calls, and made to feel worthless”, resulting in them wanting to leave their job.

Further ethnic minority employees detailed how much harder it was to progress into more senior roles with low numbers of black leaders.

Unite and Unison have also alleged that white employees undergoing disciplinary action would receive “more favourable and less harsh treatment”.

The collective grievance regarding institutionalised racism began by UNITE and Unison in July 2020, following the suspension of three staff within weeks of each other. The outcomes of which were still not known.

In a statement, Patrick Harley, Conservative leader of Dudley Council, said: “We know we haven’t always got it right, which is why we commissioned this review.

“It is not acceptable that our BAME employees are more likely to face disciplinary processes, experience bullying and not have fair access to promotion opportunities.

“Following this review, we will now be challenging ourselves to do much better.”