Councillors urged to back Bame community

Devon urged to celebrate minorities

Devon councillors will be urged to continue to find and take opportunities to promote and celebrate the role and work in Devon by BAME people past and present. Bame people are recent migrants or have parents who were migrants and therefore will have British heritage beyond two or three generations.

The council’s cabinet also recommended to next month’s full council meeting that they support and encourage and members to continue to engage with Bame people, and to encourage schools and settings to write a 'position statement’ in reference to the Black Lives Matter campaign and post it clearly on their website.

The recommendation also calls for the council to write to the secretary of state for education, urging him to write to schools to reflect on how they challenge historic and persisting racist ideas and to how they celebrate diversity and to capture the voice of children and young people and consider how their practices and structures will change in responses to the recent Black Lives Matter movement.

It follows a motion that had been put forward by Cllr Claire Wright, which called for the council to pledge support for the Black Lives Matter campaign and identify a cabinet minister champion for the Bame community.

Cllr Wright’s motion had been created by working alongside with students at The Kings School, especially young Bame people, and follows on from the peaceful protests organised following the murder of George Floyd in the USA by a police officer.

She said that when she proposed the motion initially at the July council meeting, she faced dozens of hostile comments from members of the public about it, saying that it just underlined the prejudices that are in the community, adding: “I’m sure Devon County Council are doing what they can to engage with BAME communities.”

Cllr Alistair Dewhirst said that he was looking forward to this motion being adopted at the full council meeting, while Cllr Rob Hannaford added: “We do need to come to terms with the legacy or empire and slavery and it does need to be taught in schools.”

The cabinet also recommended that a motion, submitted by Cllr Alan Connett, around diversity and council policy, also be supported at full council.

His motion called for the council to support current and planned activities which help to enable everyone in Devon to participate in, and contribute, to its society, economy, and communities, to remove barriers, and tackle prejudice and inequalities.

The recommendation would also see the council encourage all mechanisms that would increase of the diversity of councillors, supports all Members to actively engage with Bame people and organisations, and provide advice and support to schools on how they can support students understanding of Bame experiences, their history and contributions.

The final decision on the adoption of the motion will be made when the full council meets on Thursday 1 October.