The government’s commission on racial disparity ignores the role of institutional racism in the lives of young people
When Boris Johnson established a new commission on race and ethnic disparities after the Black Lives Matter protests last year, many doubted how serious this body would be. Its chair, Tony Sewell, had in the past openly questioned the existence of institutional and structural racism. Now the commission’s first report has been published, it’s even clearer that its purpose was to whitewash the problems of racism in Britain.
The 264-page report argues that the UK has become a “more open society” in which issues of race and racism are becoming less important for explaining persistent inequalities. According to its authors, the report’s findings challenge the view that Britain has “failed to make progress in tackling racial inequality”, and suggest that the “well-meaning ‘idealism’ of many young people who claim the country is still institutionally racist is not borne out by evidence”.
