6. Statement by the Minister for Social Justice: Tackling institutionalised and systemic racism — Anti-racist Wales Action Plan

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 4:15 pm on 7 June 2022.

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Photo of Jane Hutt Jane Hutt Labour 4:15, 7 June 2022

Diolch yn fawr, Joyce Watson. You've absolutely spelled it out so clearly—this is about ending institutional racism. Therefore, we have to look at those institutions, including our own, and tackle that. I will leave it to the Deputy Minister, who I'm sure will be addressing the questions particularly in her portfolio around sport, and the education Minister on education. We thought it would be good to have several statements. This is not just for the Minister for Social Justice; indeed, every Minister could be standing up and making a statement today, because it's relevant to every Minister, and you'll see that in the action plan.

But, just quickly on health, I've already mentioned the contribution, the role and the experience of the health and social care workforce in terms of the role that they play, not just in the pandemic but always in our health service. They have exposed to us the inequities in the workforce, time and time again recognising that this is something where they haven't always been recognised and had a level playing field in terms of their opportunities. So, it is good that the Minister for health is establishing an NHS health inequalities group. This is going to particularly draw on lived experiences to identify the barriers that black, Asian and minority ethnic people have experienced in accessing health services. And, obviously, these are issues that we've been discussing in terms of access to women's health—this is very intersectional—in terms of the anti-racist action plan.

We need to ensure that we have anti-racist leadership and education in NHS Wales at every level and in every board, and we have to—it goes back to data—underpin this with data collection so that we have an evidence base for our progress.