REPORT ANNUAL CONFERENCE
Look at what you need to do to become an authentic ally , delegates are told
Race and racism in our society is not an issue to be dealt with specifically within healthcare ; it ’ s an issue that needs to be dealt with across our society and across the globe .
This was the opening comment from Yvonne Coghill CBE , race adviser , NHS Race and Health Observatory , in a keynote on the 7 A ’ s of allyship .
The NHS Constitution is to provide a high-quality service ,’ she stressed . ‘ Since the inception of the NHS , we have had people from all over the globe come to help us , to support us and to make sure that we can deliver high-quality care to our populations ’.
The statistics show that the NHS is the biggest organisation in the UK : 13 per cent of all allied health professionals ( AHPs ) are from Black , Asian or minority ethnic groups – but this is still less than the 15 per cent of the total UK population and a lot less than the 21 per cent of staff from those backgrounds in the NHS as a whole . Meanwhile , only 9 per cent of Black , Asian and minority ethnic staff are occupational therapists .
So , Yvonne continued , ‘ what we know is that the proportion of occupational therapists who are from a Black , Asian or minority ethnic background is much lower than in the general population , and much lower than in other areas of the NHS .’
But why is this important and does it really matter , she asked . Looking specifically at employee engagement and NHS performance ( www . kingsfund . org . uk / sites / default / files / employee-engagementnhs-performance-west-dawson-leadership-review2012-paper . pdf ) she said that there is ‘ a spiral of positivity in the best performing NHS trusts ’.
Quoting from the authors of the King ’ s Fund paper , she said ‘ The extent to which staff are committed to their organisations and to which they recommend their trust as a place to receive treatment and to work is strongly related to patient outcomes and patient satisfaction . Climates of trust and respect characterise these top performing trusts .’
In other words , the experience of Black , Asian or minority ethnic staff ‘ is a very good barometer of the climate of respect and care for all within NHS trusts ’.
Yvonne Coghill CBE
‘ When I saw this I thought : this is fantastic , people will recognise that everyone , regardless of their background , must be treated well and with dignity and respect . It ’ s a must have ,’ she said . ‘ In order to do this in an increasingly diverse population we need to make sure that our workforce is diverse and that they feel fully included .’
Explaining why diversity and inclusion are so important , she said the are four cases : legal , moral , quality care and financial . She added : ‘ We are all in this together – last year , after the George Floyd incident and Black Lives Matter came to the fore , people were asking me , what do we do about this ? That is why I wrote the 7 A ’ s of authentic allyship .’
She went on : ‘ It ’ s about how we all of us work to make sure that everybody , regardless of their background , feels included and part of our NHS . About all of us recognising that there are things for us to do and ways to behave in order to support and help our colleagues in the workplace . ‘ When I say that people from BAME backgrounds across the board in the NHS have a worse experience of working within the NHS , I am hoping you will believe that . As director of WRES , we collected data for five years and found that doctors , nurses , AHPs , and administration , they had and reported a working experience worse than their NHS counterparts .’
In a strong statement for change she added : ‘ In order for us to have an NHS that is going to be fully inclusive , an organisation that ’ s going to give its best to patients , we have to make sure that everybody understands the importance of working together to get to that place .’
The ‘ 7 A ’ s ’ ( Appetite ; Ask ; Accept ; Acknowledgement ; Apologise ; Assume ; Action ) help people ‘ who don ’ t know or don ’ t understand what they need to do in order for us to get to this place ’.
Yvonne concluded : ‘ In order to become an authentic ally , it ’ s about looking at what you need to do , in order to support other people , so that ultimately everyone can be the best that they can be in order to deliver high-quality patient care , patient safety and patient satisfaction .
‘ Race equality is not an easy thing , but I ’ m hoping using the 7 A ’ s will help people get from where they are to a place that they can
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start to help to support each other .’
In order to become an authentic ally , it ’ s looking at what you need to do in order to support other people so that ultimately everyone can be the best that they can be in order to deliver high-quality patient care , patient safety and patient satisfaction .
Yvonne Coghill CBE race adviser , NHS Race and Health Observatory
16 OTnews July 2021