Our approach to Equality and Diversity
"Fair for all….personal to each"
We are absolutely committed to delivering excellence and our approach to equality and diversity is built on the principle of ‘fair for all, personal to each’.
Our commitment to equality and diversity led us to set the Priority Objective ‘Promoting Equality and Diversity and Community Cohesion’, and working with our LSP partners, we know we are making a positive difference for our communities.
We want South Tyneside to be a place where no one experiences discrimination or disadvantage because of their age, gender, race, disability, faith or belief or sexual orientation.
To ensure this happens, we have a comprehensive approach to rolling out Equality Checks, also known by some partners as Equality Impact Assessments.
Our approach is very much proactive and by working in partnership with our LSP we know we can ensure services are delivered in a way that is fair for all, but personal to each without waiting for service users to tell us about the barriers they face.
Communities of Common Interest
Across South Tyneside, there are people who share interests through their daily lives, they might share interests due to a disability, their gender, their age or their sexual orientation.
The Communities of Common Interest infrastructure enables people with a shared interest to come together to be empowered and involved in decision making, democratic life and in co-producing their own outcomes.
We know that our public sector partners are also meeting their statutory duties and a range of forums exist in South Tyneside to bring partners together. The Equality and Diversity Board brings South Tyneside Homes, the Council and the Third Sector together. The Multi Agency Racist Incident Forum brings the Police, Fire, South Tyneside Homes, the Council and transport providers together. We know that it is only through partnership working that we can deliver our vision.
Equality checks
We are committed to the principle of delivering excellent services and we don’t want our residents to experience discrimination or face barriers to accessing our services. Our Equality Check process helps ensure this happens.
The Equality Check process is an essential part of the corporate policy framework; this ensures that as we develop or refresh any policy, plan or strategy, officers must carry out an Equality Check.
This successfully ensures that the strategic approach is modified or amended to offset any possible discrimination and where necessary, actions are included as controls to ensure that our services to not discriminate or cause exclusion.
We have also developed a rolling programme to ensure that all plans and strategies are subjected to rigorous assessment when they are written or reviewed.
Communities of common interest
The members of the communities of common interest act as advocates and representatives of a range of organisations and people with common interests. We have the lead for each of these organisations, representing race, disability, older people, younger people and LGBT.
These groups are perfectly placed to input views and issues from the community and also to help put actions into place to promote equality and diversity.
The Communities of Common Interest group consists of representatives from the following community groups:
- Compact for Racial Equality in South Tyneside (CREST)
- Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT)
- Young People’s Parliament
- Forum 50
- South Tyneside Central Organisation on Disability STCoD
Each of these groups acts as a representative of the community of common interest.
STCoD, for example, is affiliated to 24 other groups who deal with a range of disabilities from mental health to visual impairments.
Equality and Diversity Programme Board
Strong leadership and commitment to equality and diversity comes from the Equality and Diversity Programme Board.
The Board meets quarterly and is responsible for the strategic direction of the equalities agenda, overseeing the implementation of the Corporate Equality Plan, and ensuring progress is made to promoting equality and diversity.
Membership of the board consists of the Lead Member for Equality and Diversity, a representative from each of our Communities of Common Interest groups (CREST, ST COD, Forum 50, LGBT, and Youth Parliament), the council’s two Assistant Chief Executives, Heads of Service and the Policy Manager, as well as a representative from South Tyneside Homes and other key partners as appropriate.
The representatives of the Board were carefully identified to ensure that we had the key influencers from both within the council and across our communities of common interest.
The benefit of this is that as issues are raised, barriers identified or progress unachieved, the Board members are perfectly placed to ensure corrective action is taken.
