I’m glad Govt is ditching diversity training – it’s junk science, cash is better spent on schemes for working class kids
THE Government’s war on woke continues.
Now it has promised to axe pointless diversity and inclusion schemes within the civil service in what it has branded a “common sense fightback”.
And not a minute too soon.
Speaking on Monday, minister Esther McVey — dubbed the Minister for Common Sense — said the Tories would scrap roles solely dedicated to ensuring diversity and inclusion, which she described as a “pointless job creation scheme for the politically correct”.
McVey said ditching these jobs, which cost taxpayers millions, would stop the “back-door politicisation of the civil service, which diverts time and resources from that focus on the public”.
Intellect of a turnip
The minister — who wants a crack down on workers wearing LGBT+ rainbow lanyards — also said the Government would aim to abolish civil service staff networks, many of which have become compromised and are turning what should be a wholly impartial public service into a forum for religious and political activism.
Those dismissing this move as a pointless “culture war” manoeuvre designed to distract from the Government’s record and refusing to accept the issue DOES matter, fall into two groups: Those being wilfully ignorant because they don’t want to agree with a Tory; or those with the intellectual prowess of a turnip. Some poor sods fall into both.
Of course it matters that we’re spending precious public resources on schemes that often just end up being divisive.
Of course it matters that too many officials, who are supposed to be impartial, are being sucked into putting political views over public service.
Take the Civil Service Muslim network for example.
The group, which brings together Muslim civil servants, was suspended in March after reports that it had hosted speakers who encouraged civil servants to “lobby” government ministers to take a more anti-Israel stance.
However, in response a government spokesperson added: “The CSMN shares these concerns and has temporarily suspended its activities pending a full investigation.”
Our money has been thrown at external companies to train staff on diversity and inclusion issues for far too long.
It is a racket. Many of these external companies are simply there to push a single ideological viewpoint and their divisive narratives are anything but “inclusive”.
There are very clear reasons why we should do away with the majority of diversity and inclusion schemes.
Firstly, because there is far too little evidence to show that any of it works.
Diversity training and unconscious bias training are, in my view, junk science.
Secondly, hiring stand-alone public sector diversity managers is money spaffed up the wall.
When I went on the government jobs site, I found a Head Of Inclusion And Diversity for the House of Lords being advertised for a cushy salary of up to 70 grand.
In return for regurgitating some guff about how your colleagues need to “do better to dismantle patriarchal, heteronormative, structurally racist structures in the workplace”, you too can have a comfortable, middle-class life bank-rolled by the taxpayer.
There are doctors saving lives in hospitals that don’t even earn that.
A 2020 report estimated that there are 10,000 diversity and inclusion jobs in public services such as the NHS, local councils and government departments costing the UK taxpayer more than half a billion pounds every year.
It found that, on average, councils across the UK employ two full-time diversity and inclusion staff, that each police force on average employs five, and that government departments are spending £11.5million a year on staff who exclusively focus on diversity and inclusion.
I’m still waiting for anyone to produce any evidence that shows how the money invested in hiring D&I managers and in diversity training has improved the way public services are delivered.
I won’t hold my breath, mind you.
Obsessing about pronouns
I’m not suggesting that scrapping D&I roles is going to open the taps to an endless money fountain.
But when it comes to people who aren’t being included and who aren’t getting an equal shot at life, we should be helping the poorest, especially the young, get on in life.
The number of 16 to 18-year-olds who are not in education, employment or training (NEET) is at its highest rate in 12 years, with poorer kids much more likely to be NEET.
Less than half of free-school-meal pupils pass English and Maths GCSE, compared to 75 per cent of better-off pupils.
Working-class people are the most excluded group in virtually all aspects of life and still the most overlooked when it comes to so-called “diversity and inclusion schemes”.
Perhaps if the diversity and inclusion industry hadn’t spent so long obsessing about pronouns and white privilege, and shutting down everyone who raised opposition to their teachings and tactics, they would be taken more seriously.
But their complete inability to produce evidence that what they’ve been doing so far has improved opportunities for those who need them most — or improved life for the rest of us — means that the only thing wrong with McVey’s announcement is that it didn’t come sooner.