I relish all the opportunities to speak in public debates that come my way. But once in a while an event makes me uneasy. Perhaps the topic is a little unusual and I am to be the only woman on a panel. It’s not that I have any problem debating with men. Far from it. What makes me uncomfortable is the gnawing suspicion that I have been asked to participate because the organisers needed to tick a gender equality box.
Forbidden from having only male speakers, they have searched for a woman and landed on me. While the men can be confident their work has earned them a seat at the table, I’m left wondering if I am there because of my genitals. The push for diversity might have been well-intentioned but, in my case at least, it backfired.
Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) initiatives increasingly shape our experiences at work and our interactions with public services. Research by the Conservative Way Forward group of MPs shows that nearly 8,000 public sector workers are employed exclusively on EDI projects at a cost of £427 million a year. One million working days each year are spent on equality and diversity training.
The NHS is the biggest recruiter, with 800 people employed in EDI roles. Local authorities have 794 equality officers, universities are home to 724 and police forces have 250. A new report from the TaxPayers’ Alliance claims public sector prisons in England and Wales spent more than £11 million on EDI roles over the past two years.
Go back a couple of decades and the role of EDI officer simply did not exist. People worked in “human resources” and, before that, “personnel”. Yet since becoming established, the number of EDI appointments, and the money to fund them, has increased rapidly. Direct comparisons are difficult but back in 2013, the TaxPayers’ Alliance reported that the NHS employed 165 equality and diversity staff at a cost of £6.8 million; the 800 in such roles last year cost more than £40 million.
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The job description for an EDI officer reads like a game of jargon bingo. It involves “promoting equality” and “changing attitudes” among both colleagues and service users — that’s us, the public, should we need a doctor or a police officer. Recent initiatives include instructing nurses to tell patients who express concern about trans women on female-only hospital wards that they are comparable to racists and may have to be “removed”. It is easy to be outraged. But if we accept that equality and diversity are important principles, might this be money well spent?
The evidence does not look good. Over 80 per cent of all UK-based companies run EDI training sessions on “unconscious bias” — the idea that no matter what we might say or do, we harbour deeply rooted prejudices that can be revealed through rapid-fire computer tests. Yet the American Psychological Association acknowledged over a decade ago that people’s unconscious bias scores vary from one test to another and are often dependent on context.
In 2020, a review by the Government Equalities Office found no evidence that unconscious bias training “changes behaviour in the long term or improves workplace equality in terms of representation of women, ethnic minorities or other minority groups”. The Harvard Business Review notes that “even when the training is beneficial, the effects may not last after the program ends”.
It is not just unconscious bias testing; the effectiveness of all forms of diversity training are being called into question. One concern is that EDI initiatives may actually make social equality and workplace relations worse. A recent American Psychological Association report suggests minority applicants for jobs may be deterred by corporate mission statements that emphasise diversity as being good for business. Participants were concerned these companies would “see and judge them, as well as their work, in light of their social identity”.
Money spent on EDI officers could be put to better use. With the NHS in crisis, crime rates rising and prisons overcrowded, the obvious answer would be to take money away from ineffective staff training programmes and spend it on frontline services instead. This might make life better for patients, inmates and victims of crime — but it will, arguably, do little to promote equality.
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At present, the average salary of an EDI officer is £41,915 a year. Entry-level positions start at £34,677 with the most experienced workers making up to £56,799 a year. The NHS hires diversity managers on an annual salary of £77,000. In comparison, the average care worker takes home £23,410 a year. They start on £21,133 and may, over time, reach a salary of £38,846.
Unsurprisingly, women and people from ethnic minorities are over-represented in lower-paid frontline health and social care roles such as cleaners, carers, porters and security workers. When it comes to adult social care, 82 per cent of the workforce is female and 23 per cent have black, Asian and minority ethnicity. Almost a quarter are employed on zero-hours contracts. Half earn within 30 pence of the national living wage — just £9.50 an hour.
So here’s an idea. If we genuinely care about equality, diversity and inclusion, let’s defund the profligate EDI industry and give carers, cleaners and porters a bumper pay rise — irrespective of their genitals, skin colour or sexual preferences. That way, we will improve public services and improve equality.
Emma Duncan is away
