It is a sad fact that many individuals have negative attitudes towards others purely on the grounds of racial difference. Britain has long been considered a country of immigration, ever since the post-war period when thousands of immigrants were invited to the country in order to help fill the employment gap. The idea of bringing in black immigrants to fill the labour gap was highly illogical since there was widespread racism in Britain at the time. The race riots of the late 1950s in Notting Hill and Nottingham necessitated government action to improve race relations. The government adopted a binary approach, responding to public anxiety about black immigration to Britain, whilst attempting to promote racial harmony within Britain.

Although immigration has since been drastically reduced, and this has allayed the fears of the population about ‘floods’ of immigrants invading the country, there has been a need for successive post-war governments to introduce policies to improve race relations within the UK.

The Race Relations Act of 1965 was introduced to tackle racial discrimination. It made discrimination unlawful on the grounds of “colour, race or ethnic or national origin.” It also made incitement to racial hatred a criminal offence. Although the act was very weak and limited, it was the first step towards better race relations.

There were two main areas where the act was limited. Firstly, it only applied to public places such as cinemas, pubs and restaurants. It did not apply to education, employment an housing, which is where most of the discrimination occurred. Secondly, if you were guilty of discrimination you could not have criminal procedures sanctioned against you. Instead, the Race Relations Board was introduced to conciliate the parties involved. People could not be prosecuted. In theory, the RRB could take an offender to the Attorney General, but in reality no one ever was.

Roy Jenkins realised that there were loopholes in the 1965 Act. He wanted to extend the legislation, but the Labour government of the time only had a small majority, and therefore would have found difficult in getting any radical legislation through parliament. Jenkins attempts to extend the legislation were also overshadowed by events overseas.

In 1968, the Labour government passed a second Race Relations Act. This was partly in reaction to reports which showed that racial discrimination was still widespread, and that the 1965 Act had been ineffective. The 1968 Race Relations Act covered education, housing and employment. However, although these areas were now covered, discrimination was still left to reconciliation to be solved.

By the early 1970s it was found that race relations had not really improved. The Race Relations Act had not been particularly effective. When Labour came to power in 1974, they bought in new legislation to try to improve race relations.

The Race Relations Act of 1976 introduced several innovations. As well as confirming the outlawing of direct discrimination, the legislation introduced the concept of indirect discrimination. Positive action was also made permissible, although it was not obligatory for bodies to put this into practice. The 1976 Act also gave individuals the right to take cases of discrimination directly to courts or industrial tribunals which could award damages. Furthermore, local authorities were given special responsibility for eliminating unlawful discrimination and promoting equal opportunities. The Commission for Racial Equality (CRE) was also established. This is currently headed by Herman Ousley.

The CRE was set up as an agency which combined and extended the law enforcement and public education roles previously performed by the Race Relations Board and Community Relations Commission respectively. The CRE was seen as having three main duties. It would work towards the elimination of racial discrimination and to promote equality of opportunity, encourage good relations between people from different ethnic backgrounds, and monitor the way that the Race Relations Act is working and recommend ways in which it can be improved.

Some say that the 1976 Race Relations Act has not been particularly successful. Racial discrimination is still rife in Britain. The first area in which the Act has fallen down is in the idea of indirect discrimination. Individuals have found it difficult to define and to prove indirect discrimination.

The CRE has been reasonably successful. It does wield a certain amount of power but, unfortunately, it has never had the resources that it needs to be effective. Furthermore, if the CRE wants to take someone to court it has to deal with every level of the legal process which is very expensive and very time consuming. The CRE has also had the problem that it has had to combine a legal role with an educational role, and this has been very demanding. In the 1980s, the CRE appealed to the government for more resources and more power, but the appeals were ignored. The Conservatives did not want to spend more money, and also had a laissez-faire attitude to race relations. The CRE was starved of cash, and some MPs even called for its abolition. Despite this, it carried on, although it received little financial or political support.

Not many people have taken up the opportunity to take their case to court. One reason for this is that the judiciary tend to appear unsympathetic to the victims of racial discrimination. The number of cases actually won is also very low, and this has acted as a disincentive to victims to take their cases to court. This is possible as a result of the difficulty in proving indirect discrimination. Furthermore, the damages received for successful cases was originally quite low. Despite this, recently, cases against racial discrimination have been quite successful. In 1993, a textile firm was taken to court. The firm had separate shifts for Asian and White workers. The Asian workers were not being paid overtime, and were also getting less holiday time. The firm was forced to pay £200,000 to its Asian workers. In the same year, a Sikh police constable took his force to court because he had been denied promotion to sergeant twice. He was awarded £25,000 in damages. We can conclude then that some individuals have been successful when taking their cases to court, and that the effect of allowing individuals do this has been beneficial.

The weakness in giving local authorities special responsibility is that they have not been compelled to promote equal opportunities. Even so, the GLC did establish very radical race relations policies. However, a lot of Conservative run councils, and a number of other councils, have chosen not to bother with the issue of race relations and equal opportunities.

The 1980s and early 1990s were not a very good time for race relations and equal opportunities. The ideas of equality were not very popular in the eighties. They were replaced with the ideas of hard work and self help. Furthermore, the early 1980s and the early 1990s were periods of economic recession. Unfortunately, Afro-Carribeans tended to be concentrated in low-paid, unstable employment. They were the first to be hit by economic downturn. Moreover, employers had a lot of power because of high unemployment making it more difficult to pursue policies of equal opportunities. Additionally, anti racist policies were portrayed as threatening and slightly ludicrous by some people, in particular the tabloid press.

Thatcher’s attack on local government culminated in the abolition of the GLC and other metropolitan councils. Local government had been given the responsibility for pursual of equal opportunities policy. Councils that were strong on race relations tended to be Labour controlled and were at the forefront of pushing through legislation to help ethnic minorities. Lambeth council was the first to set up a race relations unit, headed by Herman Ousley, in 1978. The degree of race relations policy throughout he country was very uneven. In 1986, the GLC was abolished. Furthermore, from 1983, Neil Kinnock moved the Labour party to the right. He distanced himself from the actions of local Labour councils. The GLC had been successful, however, in bringing to light the fact that Black participation in politics was very low. Infact, there was not a black MP in Parliament between 1929 and 1987.

In the 1992 general election, it was shown that race and immigration could still be politically important issues. Probably the most important racial incident of the 1992 election happened in Cheltenham. Cheltenham was a safe Conservative seat. John Taylor was chosen to stand for the seat. He was a successful barrister. He was also the first Afro-Carribean man to be selected for a Conservative seat. Unfortunately, the Head of the Local Conservative Association tried to get him deselected. He said, “We will not let bloody Nigers into this town.” In the election, Taylor lost the seat. The swing from Conservative to Liberal in Cheltenham was 5.4%. Nationally, there was only a 2.4% swing. This is evidence of a preserved attitude of racism in British society.

Evidence suggests that the status of Black people has not greatly improved since the 1960s. Ethnic minorities are still concentrated in low paid and insecure employment. Unemployment among the ethnic minorities is also disproportionately high. However, there have been increasing numbers of minorities making it through to managerial and professional positions, though very few have been able to make it through to the top jobs in business or politics. There are no black people in the top ranks of the civil service or the judiciary. The number of ethnic minority MPs is also disproportionately low.

The overall economic activity rate for people of working age from ethnic minorities in Britain in 1995/96 was lower, at 65%, than the rate for White people, which was 80%. At 18%, the unemployment rate for people from ethnic minorities was more than double the rate for White people of 8%.

The ethnic minorities are still also concentrated in cheap, low quality housing. They are more likely to be made homeless and it takes longer for them to be re-housed.

A study in a Black newspaper called the “Weekly Journal,” found that 92% of the Black community believed that White people were treated better than they were by the police. This was supported by findings that Black people were twice as likely to be stopped in their car, and four times as likely to be stopped on foot. The number of complaints against the police for racism increased from 49 in 1991 to 291 in 1993. A lot of members of the ethnic communities feel alienated. Members of the black community are also the victims of racial attacks, including intimidation, assault and murder. In 1992, there were 5,000 incidents of racial attack. In 1996, this had risen to 12,000. Racial incidents in England and Wales rose by 3% to 12,222 in 1995/96. It is believed that a lot of cases go unreported.

There are a number of fatal and near fatal accidents in recent years which have been racially motivated. Mohan Singh Kullah, a 60-year-old Asian shopkeeper, was beaten unconscious with a brick on 27 November 1994 outside his home in Neath, South Wales. He died in hospital on 6 December. Three local men in their early twenties were charged with murder. Ali Ibrahim Abu Zaid, a 21-year-old Sudanese student, was stabbed to death in Brighton on 7 November 1993. His killer was sentenced to imprisonment for a minimum of 20 years. Fiat Mirza, an Asian taxi driver, was murdered in the East London dock area on 26 February 1993 by two white youths, who were later given up to the police by their families. Both were convicted of murder, and one of them is serving a minimum 22-year prison term. Kenneth Harris, a 31 year-old black man was beaten, stabbed and run over with his own car on 18 October 1993, because he had a white girlfriend. Three men were convicted, and received aggravated sentences for racial motivation.

It is important to consider that the rise in the number of incidents reported is not necessarily attributable to a rise in the actual level of racial harassment. It may reflect an increase in reporting by victims, or an increase in the number of incidents recorded by the police as being racially motivated.

There is the problem of the extreme right in Britain, especially in South East London. There are racist groups in Britain, and they are often connected with racist violence.

Government attempts to promote equal opportunities have failed for a number of reasons. Policies to promote equal opportunities have always been low down on the political agenda. Politicians have been far more concerned with controlling immigration. The black community has been seen as a problem. Issues of race relations have taken second place to immigration control. The CRE lacks the money and the power that it needs. It has also been attacked from a number of different sources. Right-wing critics have argued that the CRE follows multicultural policies which stress the differences between various groups rather than the similarities.

Responsibility for promoting good race relations has been given to the CRE and local government. Local government has not been obliged to concern itself with promoting good race relations, and therefore, in some areas, the pursual of policies to enhance race relations has been inadequate. This has also resulted in a lack of congruency between various regions of the UK.

A recent NOP poll revealed that a majority of individuals sampled agreed that Britain is a ‘fairly’ or ‘very’ racist society. Whilst most Britons saw themselves as being ‘fair minded,’ they recognised that a minority of the white population was deeply racist and agreed that many institutions of the state, such as the courts and the police, as well as many employers, discriminate against black people.

Undoubtedly, deliberate acts of racial discrimination still take place. Racial discrimination has also been unintentionally practised by organisations which may contain hidden bias against black people. Clearly, the Race Relations Acts have reduced the amount of expressed racial prejudice in Britain, but it is unclear how far they have gone to remove racism, and improve the relations between the various ethnic groupings which culminate to make British society.