The HSJ, as the Health Service Journal likes to be known these days, has managed to produce one of the most intriguing headlines of the week: ‘NHS is “pandering to ministers” by cutting its equality, diversity and inclusion teams to 35 whole-time posts.’
A mere 35? That, by the way, is merely the central administration of the NHS in England. It doesn’t include NHS trusts. Overall, according to a set of Freedom of Information requests submitted by the Taxpayers’ Alliance last October, NHS England employs 800 diversity and inclusion officers, at a cost of £40 million a year. What do they all do? Accuse each other of discrimination, for one thing. NHS England is currently embroiled in a tribunal claim from its own joint director of equality, diversity and inclusion.
The NHS has pledged to reduce the number of diversity officers in the NHS by 40 per cent – although you can still pick up a job if you hurry: Walton Centre NHS Foundation Trust in Liverpool is currently advertising for an equality and diversity manager on up to £47,672 a year.
But is slightly trimming the NHS’s internal equality and diversity industry really a sign of the health service ‘pandering to ministers’ or in the grip of a mad, ideological government? I can’t help thinking that a government which was really committed to keeping public spending under control would not reduce NHS England’s centrally-employed equality, diversity and inclusion team to 35; it would reduce it to zero.
True, racism, discrimination on grounds of gender, sexuality, disability and all the rest exist. Such things are abhorrent – and indeed are illegal. But can you imagine a point at which an equality and diversity department would ever announce: discrimination has fallen to the point at which it is no longer a day-to-day problem? Therefore, we congratulate ourselves on getting the job done and hereby disband our department?
You are right: no equality, diversity and inclusion department is ever going to do that. On the contrary, diversity and inclusion has become a multi-million pound industry which seeks to justify its existence at every turn. Discrimination can never be allowed to diminish; it must always be made out to be getting worse. If there is less overt racism and sexism, it is only because everyone is instead engaging in unconscious bias, which of course must be uncovered with the gentle help of endless courses and symposiums.
To keep such a self-sustaining industry in check requires ceaseless vigilance. It is not ideology which seeks to keep the numbers of staff under control, but plain and simple management. An ideological war against diversity and inclusion might please some, but it is not even nearly what we are getting from the current government.
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