How much racism do health workers face?

Thursday 05 October 2023

Racist incidents between Health staff members are "not unusual", according to the head of the service – and that's in addition to dozens of incidents of racism coming from patients.

These are often underreported, the Health department's new advisory board heard during its first public meeting on Wednesday.

During the meeting, the advisory board considered a report authored by Dr Cheryl Power (Director of Culture, Engagement and Wellbeing) and Washington Gwatidzo (Assistant General Manager and REACH [Racial and Ethnic Approaches to Community Health] lead).

They found in their research that there had been 29 instances of racial abuse amongst Health staff in the period between May 2022 and April 2023.

They collected the data by searching for a number of key words in Datix – a software designed to manage data on adverse events in healthcare. 

Staff-on-staff racial abuse

Racial abuse from one staff member to another was not reported in any of the incidents identified by the board, but Health's Interim Chief Officer clarified that this only means that incidents are not reported in the Datix platform.

Chris Bown said: "We shouldn't assume that there isn't any because there is. I know; I have spoken to a number of BME staff who have experienced [racial abuse from colleagues].

"That is clearly not acceptable."

He added that, although just one incident is too many, "it is not an unusual occurrence".

"It's completely unacceptable," repeated Mr Bown.

Abuse from patients

The report showed that there had been 29 racist incidents where the abuse came from non-staff members recorded in the Datix platform between May 2022 and April 2023.

But again, this might not tell the whole picture, as staff don't always record the harm that was caused by the incident, explained Dr Power. This means the incident is recorded as having caused "no harm".

This happens particularly often in cases where the harm is psychological.

The report adds that "there is evidence that staff frequently decline policy guidance to report racial abuse to police".

Andy Weir, Director of Mental Health and Adult Social Care, added that "weathering" is a major issue, "where staff on a daily basis are subjected to racial abuse from people who may or may not know better".

The board heard that the department is also working jointly with the Police to better handle racist incidents and other incidents of abuse.

Responses

Mr Bown added in a statement: “The situation is completely unacceptable, and as I confirmed in the first HCS Advisory Board meeting yesterday, we will take all necessary steps to protect our hard-working staff, including working with the police when incidents occur.”

Deputy Karen Wilson, Minister for Health and Social Services, said she supported Chris Bown’s statement and also what was said in the first Advisory Board meeting yesterday.

She commented: “We must all welcome and support every person who comes to work in Health and Community Services. There will be a zero-tolerance approach to any racial abuse or discrimination.” 

Connétable Andy Jehan, Vice Chair of the States Employment Board said: “Employees in the public service have every right to be respected and free from discrimination. The States Employment Board will not allow our employees to be subject to abuse, particularly abuse rooted in racism or any other form of prejudice and discrimination.

“We will actively support any action deemed necessary to protect the professional integrity of all colleagues, their personal dignity and their safety at work.”

Next steps...

Health are now planning to produce an anti-racist statement, which should be released later this month.

It was raised during this week's meeting that in Jersey, minority groups who might experience abuse are often Portuguese or Eastern European, which led to changing what was called the 'BAME [Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic] network' to the 'REACH [Racial and Ethnic Approaches to Community Health] network'.

The report also made recommendations to improve their handling of racist abuse in the future, including: 

• Changing the way that incidents are recorded in the Datix system, providing feedback and follow-up action and making sure they reflect psychological harm

• Releasing the anti-racist statement as planned, with focus groups and training sessions

• Better role modelling from line managers, who need to feel "appropriately equipped to manage and support staff when they have experienced an unacceptable behaviour incident"

Beverley Edgar, the Change team's workforce lead, told the board that this is the "first step".

"This is starting from zero, where we had nothing at all, to an anti-racist statement," she explained.