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Conclusions The Irish statutory sector has a number of characteristic features which mark it out from its UK equivalent. One of the most significant is that a less comprehensive range of statutory services has been offered in Ireland and a greater reliance has been placed on the voluntary sector. In the area of health services, a significant role is played by faith-based service providers. Provision for education in Ireland is unique insofar as the majority of schools have most of their running costs met by the State but are controlled by confessional management boards. Moreover, legislation designed to protect the religious ethos of the school permits discrimination on religious grounds in recruitment and other matters. Many other services are provided by a range of voluntary bodies but significant state support has yet to be made available to organisations working with ethnic minority groups. This lack of funding is a particular problem for ethnic and minority led organisations (MELOs). 237_Dr Mousajee Bhamjee, born in South Africa and of Indian descent, became Ireland’s first Muslim TD when he was elected in 1992 to the constituency of Clare for the Labour Party. 238_See, for instance the 2005 report of the Equality Authority: www.equality.ie/index.asp ?locID=136&docID=536 launched on 8 May 2006. Irish governance and practice has developed its own innovative approach to social partnership (referred to above), a system of consultation and negotiation which embraces the Government, employers and trade unions, agricultural interests and a number of key players from the community and voluntary sector. However, it has yet to include ethnic minority group interests in any substantial way. Political debates to date have tended to be reactive and focused on urgent issues of the day such as alleged exploitative practices by employers rather than looking to a more long-term strategic approach, although this is changing. Municipal and local authorities are key players in the UK. In Ireland, by contrast, the county, city and town councils are not yet involved to a comparable degree. There has been some progress in recent years, notably with the setting up of City and County Development Boards in the mid-1990s to ‘bring about an integrated approach to the delivery of both state and local development services at local level’. The boards provide a platform for all of the relevant players – the State, local government, social partners, local development agencies such as area partnerships, EU Leader projects and city and county enterprise boards. A crosssectoral approach to more effective service provision for minority ethnic groups could well be based on such bodies. In recent times only one TD from a minority ethnic background has been elected to the Dáil. 237 However, the political system at local level is relatively open as the right to stand for election or to vote is not dependent on migrant status. In most recent local elections in Ireland in 2004 two local councillors of immigrant backgrounds were elected, in Portlaoise and Ennis respectively. From the admittedly narrow point of view of service provision, it is suggested that the following might serve as a useful agenda for action: - - Individual discrimination against someone on any of the nine grounds covered in the legislation (gender; marital status; family status; age; disability; race; sexual orientation; religious belief; membership of the Traveller Community) is unacceptable. Yet a number of reports 238 and surveys carried out in Ireland in recent years, as well as the NCCRI’s system for the reporting of racially motivated incidents, suggest that incidents of individual racism and racial discrimination are common. Service providers need to implement appropriate and effective policies including awareness training, information campaigns and enforcement mechanisms. Service providers need to consider the extent to which they may need to vary the ways in which services are delivered and whether these need to take cultural differences into account. One frequently hears the assertion from frontline staff that ‘of course no-one should be discriminated against, but they are in this country now and they have to learn how things are done here’. If we are to achieve an approach to service provision which stresses equality but is flexible in delivery methods, we must address the specificities of the needs of migrants and ethnic minorities – that is, those needs, over and above those of others who may use the same services, which arise because they are members of migrant and ethnic minorities.
improving government service delivery to minority ethnic groups Chapter 4: Ireland Research Findings 136_137 239_For example, female frontline staff report being told by male clients that they wish to do business with a male civil servant. - - The questions raised are not simple ones and provision for diversity must always take place within an agreed framework of common values. Certain core values, such as gender equality, may conflict with issues of cultural specificity. 239 Service providers, both voluntary and statutory, are players and stakeholders within broader civil society. Policy and service provision will need to take account of emerging policy and legislation at national level. Service providers need to carry out comprehensive audits of their existing policies with a view to implementing specific targets for change, reliable indicators for monitoring and evaluating change and measurable outputs. Such an approach should reflect the understanding which we now have of the nature of institutional racism and xenophobia and should include recruitment and promotion practices within the organisation. There is a considerable body of experience in Ireland on a related topic – gender discrimination – which could usefully be drawn upon. The aim should be to ‘equality-proof’ and ‘diversityproof’ service provision in the same way that some organisations have already sought actively (although not always successfully) to gender-proof their services.
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IMPROVING GOVERNMENT SERVICE DELIVE
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About this publication This is the
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One of the innovative elements of t
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CHAPTER 4: IRELAND RESEARCH FINDING
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Executive Summary 8_ title EXECUTIV
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improving government service delive
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Chapter 1: Context 26_27 CHAPTER 1:
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It states that the long term, high
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Demographics 78 Overview of Migrant
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Figure 2: National Insurance Number
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Methods A questionnaire was designe
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- - - The Conduct of Employment Age
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Targeting For all organisations tas
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Case Example 2 - Health Craigavon A
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Case Example 4 - Employment 110 Bus
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esearch; however, it appeared that
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The PSNI annual Human Rights confer
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Benchmarking The issue of data coll
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Despite the increase in recorded in
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Table 2: Breakdown of Respondents b
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Figure 4: Percentage of Respondents
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Figure 5: Ease of Providing Service
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The impact of Section 75 on organis
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Table 9: Data Collected Yes No Don
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Lack of knowledge in the health sec
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Housing In regard to housing issues
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Chapter 3: Scotland Research Findin
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Page 112 and 113: Figure 8: PPSNs Poland 103,177 55%
Page 114 and 115: Prospects for ongoing strong immigr
Page 116 and 117: Both the Equal Employment Act 1998
Page 118 and 119: Methodology The NPAR will undoubted
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Page 122 and 123: Awareness of legislation and policy
Page 124 and 125: e expected to pay the non-EU fee, w
Page 126 and 127: Interviews carried out with employe
Page 128 and 129: Official agencies and policies in t
Page 130 and 131: Targeting The need to target ethnic
Page 132 and 133: Employment By and large Irish immig
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Page 136 and 137: An anti-racism intercultural progra
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Page 152 and 153: As discussed above, there is a lack
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Page 156 and 157: - - - - - - - Existing UK migration
Page 158 and 159: “ …the four As that the previou
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Page 163 and 164: Appendix 2: List of Organisations I
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Page 169 and 170: Glossary 166_167 Glossary 267_Scott
Page 173 and 174: Acronyms 170_171 Acronyms280 280_In
Page 176: This research has been carried out
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