BYM submits evidence to UN on UK racism
Britain Yearly Meeting has submitted evidence to the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination
The UK must do more to tackle racism, Britain Yearly Meeting (BYM) has told a review by the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD).
‘We believe the main cause of racial and ethnic disparities in the UK is an ongoing narrative of British superiority towards other countries and peoples,’ BYM wrote as evidence to the first CERD review of the UK in eight years, which is heard this month.
It also highlighted areas contributing towards racism as education, immigration and asylum, and policing.
The UK should scrap or amend the Public Order Act (2023) and stop-and-search policies, which ‘give already institutionally racist UK police substantial power’, BYM has recommended.
It also highlighted that black people are nine times more likely to be stopped and searched according to the UK government’s own statistics. The UK’s immigration policies also perpetuate racism by demonising migrants and asylum seekers.
In education, the Prevent programme has been shown to disproportionately target and stigmatise Muslim young people and should be abolished, the submission said. It also recommends that all UK education systems should work with unions, teachers, and young people on an antiracist education strategy. Noting the rise in permanent exclusions in UK schools, it said: ‘Our research highlights that permanent school exclusions are racialised.’
Alongside BYM’s written evidence, Edwina Peart, BYM’s equity and justice lead, is submitting video evidence to be viewed by CERD members.
Other groups submitting evidence include Amnesty International and the Racial Equality Network. The last review was in 2016.
