Race is one of the protected characteristics that is defined under the Equality Act. Any discrimination based on race and ethnicity is unlawful and we carry out People Impact Assessments to protect our community and staff from this. For more information around our legal duties, click here.
So, how do we consider race as a protected characteristic in practice?
Our communities
We take a proactive approach in ensuring that we can support all members of our communities, working hard to learn about and identify the risk factors relating to cultural practices that may increase fire risk. We attend Local Resilience Forums to better understand the needs of our local communities, enabling us to focus our work to the specific needs of the area. Race and ethnicity therefore form part of our community profiling work.
Crews take pride in engaging with their local communities to help break down any perceived barriers and improve their understanding. This engagement is reported to our Culture Development Committee on a quarterly basis, with details of what we have learned and suggestions for what more we can do to improve our services and meet the needs of under-represented groups.
Dorset and Wiltshire both have predominantly White British populations; however, there are certain areas across our Service where diversity is greater, for example in the conurbations such as Bournemouth and Swindon, as well as areas of Wiltshire such as Trowbridge.
We all have a responsibility to listen to our communities and understand what they need to feel safe and included. We are mindful there are barriers and fears of discrimination that affect how people from different ethnic backgrounds see public service organisations. We therefore consider when there may be times when wearing uniform is not appropriate, such as fire safety visits.
To support any community members who do not have English as a first language, we adapt our communications. This is achieved with the use of language appropriate booklets and translation services. This website can also be translated into over 100 different languages and we engage with local services and partner organisations who specialise in community languages.
Within our workforce
We have a Minority Ethnic (ME) Staff Network, which meets quarterly for support and is instrumental in helping to shape and form policy. Our ME network is a space where all staff are encouraged to listen, share and learn about each other’s experiences. This group helps us to identify areas where we can be better. From these powerful and important conversations, we can be more aware and better equipped to reduce or remove barriers or privileges that operate within our Service and community areas.
Just over 2% of our workforce are from an ethnic minority background, compared to the 7.7% of our local population in Dorset and Wiltshire (according to 2021 Census report). We are committed to increasing the diversity of our workforce to better represent all of our community through our approach to positive action.