January 2005/04 (web only)
Guide

 

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HEFCE Race Equality Scheme

Revised December 2004

This document explains how the Council plans to meet its statutory duty, under the Race Relations (Amendment) Act 2000, to eliminate unlawful racial discrimination and to promote equality of opportunity between people of different racial groups. The scheme provides a strategic direction for integrating fair treatment into the Council’s functions, identifies priorities and sets out an action plan to address these issues.

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Table of contents, foreword and overview (read on-line)

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Contents

• Foreword
• Overview of race equality at HEFCE
• Introduction
• Context
• Specific duties
• Employment duties
• Our approach
• A Race Equality Scheme
• Assessment of HEFCE functions
• HEFCE policy development
• Our monitoring arrangements
• Our functions
  • Widening participation and fair access
  • Enhancing excellence in learning and teaching
  • Enhancing excellence in research
  • Enhancing the contribution of HE to the economy and society
  • Building on institutional strengths
  • Enhancing leadership, governance and management
  • Excellence in delivery
    • Human resources
    • Staff training and development
    • Corporate communications
    • Assurance Service
    • Procurement
    • International collaboration and development
• The consultation process
• Arrangements for publishing the scheme, results of consultations and progress reports
• Complaints against the Council
• HEFCE governance
• Individual programmes and projects

• List of abbreviations

• Annex A Action plan: actions completed as of November 2004
• Annex B Action plan: actions ongoing or not yet completed 2004-06

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Foreword

The HEFCE Race Equality Scheme is intended to respond to the spirit as well as the letter of the Race Relations (Amendment) Act 2000. The scheme aims to integrate race equality and fair treatment issues into our core priorities and functions.

This is the fourth version of our scheme, amended following a sector-wide consultation exercise in summer 2002, the first annual review of the scheme in May/June 2003 and a second annual review in 2004. There have also been substantial amounts of impact assessment work done in partnership with the DfES on the new Higher Education Act. I am grateful for the constructive and supportive comments received from the sector in response to the consultation document and I hope we have accurately reflected your responses in this revised scheme. We have also consulted extensively with HEFCE teams and staff members to ensure the scheme and action plan reflect the Council's priorities and current activity,

Leadership and commitment at all levels of the organisation are central to the success of the scheme. In everything we do, we need to consider proactively how we can ensure that we do not consciously or unconsciously discriminate against or disadvantage individuals or groups. We must also positively promote good relations between people of different ethnic groups.

Higher education institutions are individually subject to the requirements of the Act, and it is not our intention to substitute for the work that they will need to do for themselves. Our scheme is designed to complement the work that is, and will be, taking place in the sector, and to offer support and guidance where this is useful and needed. But we recognise that the scheme is work in progress, to be consulted on and refined as necessary.

The underpinning and detail of the approach are described below. And the practical steps to be taken are presented as an action plan to alert those in the Council and in the sector to the work that needs to be done if we are to address the issues effectively and meet the requirements of the Act.

We would like to thank the consultation respondents for helping us to develop our scheme.

 

Sir Howard Newby
Chief Executive

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Overview of race equality at HEFCE

From Steve Egan, Director of Finance and Corporate Resources

Our vision

HEFCE is committed to achieving race equality and equality of opportunity for all who learn and work in higher education and for our own staff.

For students, we aim to ensure that all those with the potential to benefit from higher education have the opportunity to do so, whatever their background and whenever they need it. We also want to help higher education institutions develop a more demonstrably fair and supportive environment for their staff.

We promote diversity and equal opportunities in employment at HEFCE. We aim to have a diverse and well motivated workforce where all colleagues are treated equally and with respect.

Context

We understand the challenges that currently face the sector in implementing such wide-ranging legislation as the Race Relations (Amendment) Act 2000 and know there is much to be done at all levels across the sector. Some of the monitoring statistics we have collected through the Higher Education Statistics Agency illustrate this well:

• 21 per cent of black and minority ethnic UK students are studying at post-1992 institutions, compared to 14 per cent in pre-1992 institutions
• 4 per cent of professor-level academic staff are from black and minority ethnic groups compared to 8.4 per cent of lecturer-level staff
• of this 4 per cent, there are only 40 from Black British or Black African/Caribbean backgrounds (out of a total of 12,285 staff at professor level)
• as of December 2004, there are only two heads of higher education institutions who are from minority ethnic groups.

Aims

We aim to help the HE sector in England improve the diversity of its student, staff, leader and governor population. We will do this with the support of expert bodies such as the Equality Challenge Unit, the Higher Education Academy and the Leadership Foundation, who are already putting practical measures in place to help academics support a more diverse student population, update their employment practices and help to develop more leaders for the future from black and minority ethnic groups.

We understand that this process of change in higher education will be demanding, both for us and the sector. We appreciate that issues of race equality are not clear-cut, and that individuals may have multiple identities (they may be from a minority ethnic group and also have a disability for instance) and that discrimination can affect people in very different ways.

Our Race Equality Scheme has been written with these aims in mind, therefore we have taken a rigorous and structured approach to the scheme. It benefits from this approach by being thorough and well ordered; this is backed-up by a detailed Race Equality Action Plan which allocates responsibility to individuals around the Council for implementing race equality in their areas of work.

Navigation

The scheme is structured around HEFCE's strategic themes and reflects the order of our Strategic Plan 2003-08 (HEFCE 2004/17). The background and explanation of our activities in relation to student access are in the Widening Participation section of the scheme. All the actions we will be taking forward are summarised in the action plan, which is at Annex A. The action plan will be updated more regularly than the rest of the scheme.

Feedback

We welcome your feedback on our Race Equality Scheme and Action Plan, as well as any other issues regarding our work in this area. Please do not hesitate to contact me at s.egan@hefce.ac.uk or telephone 0117 931 7408 or the Project Manager Amy Norton at a.norton@hefce.ac.uk or telephone 0117 931 7316.