At North Staffordshire Combined Healthcare NHS Trust we are committed to being an anti-racist organisation.
We are a diverse and inclusive trust and there is no place in our organisation for racism, harassment, personal abuse and discrimination of any kind.
We should all feel safe and confident to be ourselves at work and feel that our individual needs and strengths are recognised.
The trust will be held accountable for any discriminative behaviours or actions towards our colleagues, service users or carers.
“Central to the maintenance of racism as a system of marginalisation is the way particular people (and their experiences) are racialised. Because white people are positioned outside of race (that is, they very rarely have to think about their race), their experiences and outlooks are considered the default. Mention of someone being white or of ‘whiteness’ as a concept is often seen as ‘woke’ or politically incorrect, which tends to curtail the discussion. Other cultural norms, beliefs, and ways of being are considered ‘different’, and an expectation is made that these individuals will adapt to a system that privileges the status quo.”
In declaring our intention towards becoming an anti-racist organisation we:
Commit
to developing understanding by colleagues, service users or carers of the scale of the institutional racism.
Challenge
race discrimination and create a fair and equitable workplace where all our colleagues can thrive.
Act
to build the personal and organisational leadership capability and accountability needed to tackle racism.
What we are doing to become an anti-racist trust
Diversity and inclusion is at the heart of our trust values, vision, our People Plan 2023–2028 and the associated ‘People’ pillar of our Trust Strategy 2023–2028.
Our board has adopted the RACE Equality Code 2020 and we are developing our own action plans to work towards optimal compliance across the code. Our board has approved this statement.
While we will continue a necessary focus on transactional activities enabling us to measure our efforts, we will apply a greater focus on transformational activities that, over time, deliver the changes in attitudes and behaviours needed if we are to become a truly anti-racist organisation where all our people can flourish.
Becoming an anti-racist organisation can involve feelings of discomfort as we each challenge our own assumptions.
Approaching this with compassion and skill can help everyone to feel valued and included.
Our Combined People Plan 2023–28
Our Combined People Plan is central in setting direction and shaping our efforts to becoming an anti-racist organisation.
To be “inclusive and representative” is the first priority in our Combined People Plan and sets out the transformational activities we will progress on our journey to becoming and anti-racist organisation.
How we will hold ourselves to account and measure our progress
North Staffordshire Combined Healthcare NHS Trust is committed to delivering on the RACE Equality Code to become a truly anti-racist trust. In delivering on this commitment, we will be open and transparent in sharing meaningful data and metrics, reviews and assessments on race equality, both in relation to the experience of our workforce and our service users.
We are committed to continuing to engage and involve our stakeholders in the development of our People Strategy and associated plans, including our RACE Code, Equality Delivery System and Workforce Race Equality Standard (WRES) plans and progress, as well as in relation to developing policy, practice and change across the organisation.
We will monitor our progress against a range of established local, regional and national metrics, including:
- the WRES (Workforce Race Equality Standard), Bank WRES and Medical WRES
- the Workforce Race Equality and Inclusion (WREI) Race Disparity Ratio
- the WRES Model Employer aspirational targets for ethnic diverse representation in senior leadership positions
- actively participating in a range of other inclusion-focused quality standards and reporting requirements (including: NHS Equality Delivery System, NHS Rainbow Badge, Sexual Orientation Monitoring Standard, Workforce Disability Equality Standard, Accessible Information Standard, Gender Pay Reporting, undertaking voluntary ethnicity pay gap analysis, and more)
How we will keep you informed
We publish an annual diversity and inclusion report detailing how we comply with our duties under the Public Sector Equality Duty. Our performance against the above standards and requirements is shared annually here.
Within the organisation, we will share this information in a range of formats (e.g. infographics) via a range of platforms such as the staff intranet, the weekly staff e-newsletter, Exec Exchange and our staff networks. We will also share our data during national and local awareness events (e.g. Black History Month, South Asian History Month, Race Equality Week).
Progress against our workforce and inclusion action plans is discussed and developed through our Directorate leadership teams, through our Inclusion Council, and monitored though our People, Culture and Development Committee (trust board sub-group) and the trust board.
We will seek to improve how we monitor and report at division and directorate levels on equity and inequity in the representation and experiences of ethnic diverse colleagues and service users. This will also be monitored at Inclusion Council and People, Culture and Development Committee (PCDC).
The changes we want to see
The changes we want to achieve through open and transparent sharing of our ambitions, plans and performance on race inclusion:
- provide data and details of our challenges, successes and failures on our anti-racism journey
- facilitate identification and deeper understanding of issues with race and racism within the trust
- inspire and support effective action to deliver and develop our anti-racist culture
- enable the trust to be held to account on our race equality strategy and performance by key stakeholders, including our workforce, our service users and carers, our local communities, our commissioners and our regulators
Our race inclusion reports will include (but are not restricted to):
- Progress in relation to equitable global majority ethnic diverse representation in senior leadership positions and across all staff groups and grades
- Race equity in access to non-mandatory learning and development and belief in fair access to career development and promotion opportunities
- Race equity in the likelihood of being appointed from shortlisting
- Race equity in the likelihood of entering formal workforce management procedures
- Reduction in bullying and harassment for all staff, and a focus on the inequity of experiences of Global Majority ethnic diverse staff.
- Equitable career development for all, including a focus on the experiences of global majority ethnic diverse colleagues
These are powerful enablers of change, especially when applied specifically to our global majority ethnic diverse workforce.
What else we will do
As part of our commitment to becoming an anti-racist organisation, the trust is also implementing the Patient and Carer Race Equity Framework (PCREF), a recommendation following the national Mental Health Act Review in 2018.
This anti-racism framework intends to support the trust to tackle and eliminate the unacceptable racial inequalities in access, experience, and outcomes faced by people from communities that experience racial inequalities, and to significantly improve their trust and confidence in mental health services we provide.
The PCREF approach is an ambitious programme with partnership working at the heart, which is split into three core components, which are our priorities:
- Leadership and governance covers the laws and regulations of all trusts under key pieces of legislation or national policy.
- Organisational competencies that the trust needs to focus on and improve. Those cultural and practical changes will be explored in consultation with ethnic diverse communities and the trust will be asked to identify actions to strengthen those competencies and implement them.
- Patient and carer feedback and assessment tool covers the way which patient and carer feedback will be sought and acted upon, using principles of transparency and clear timelines. This will ensure that patient and carer voices are embedded at the heart of the planning, implementation and learning cycle.
For more information regarding the trust’s anti-racism statement and what the trust is doing to become an anti-racist trust, please contact Diversity and Inclusion Lead, Lesley Faux: lesley.faux@combined.nhs.uk.