West Mids "Positive Discrimination"

[Lumie]

So the papers are at it again.

Fire service changes entrance test deliberately

I'm not even going to link the Daily Mail one because it's abhorrently written and not even worth your ad-viewing-money.

According to a "senior source", new applicants who are BME and females will only have to score 60% on entrance exams, whereas white males will need to score 70% in order to pass.

I can't see this being true in the slightest, but I was wondering if anyone could chime in?

In the shocking event it is true, my opinion is surely it doesn't matter on whats between your legs or what skin colour you have, a good firefighter is just that: a good firefighter. 

[Messyshaw]

In a way, this is not just positive action (a legal mechanism under the Equalities Act that allows this sort of process), but couldn't it not be seen as divisive and good old fashioned discrimination.

One of my closest friends in the job (now retired) is black. She hated any special treatment, and although I haven't spoken to her about this WMFRS policy, I know she will be livid. In the past her argument has been one of inclusion, whereas this policy divides. Are West Mids saying the only reason they have these shortages of BAME staff is that they are to thick to pass the exams? Of course they are not, but is how it could be perceived and will be by some right wing nutters. But WMFRS are dividing their workforce by ethnicity which seems a bit uncomfortable to me.

I feel its almost a bit of a lazy way of recruiting, as there are a number of reasons that BAME & women staff are under represented and I am no an expert on that, but lowering the pass mark for key groups is frankly more of an insult to those groups than it is the white men

I will be labelled a racist, but here goes. I am not entirely sure I agree with the concept that originated in the McPherson Report (following the tragic racist murder of Steve Lawrence). It came up with the notion that staffing of public services should reflect the community it serves.

That bothered me at the time and has led to this sort of stuff as the West Mids two tier entry based on race. I live in a fairly white area of London, but my local hospital is staff by mainly BAME and female staff. They are most certainly not representing the community they serve, but there's no policy by the NHS Trust to level that playing field. The local primary and infant schools that my kids went to had almost 95% female teachers, but no Heads were suggesting that male teachers applying for work would have a lower hurdle to step over.  Why would they and in any case, social engineering will always fail

When I joined, there were hardly any BAME op staff in LFB and no women. It was the 1970s and that's how it was. I  know how bloody difficult it was for the first women and BAME staff when they joined. It was hell for some. But now, in bigger cities and urban areas like West Mids, BAME firefighters are more visible than ever. Potential recruits are nowhere near as badly off as 40 years ago in terms of feeling isolated or the job isn't for them, so why are there shortages? 

I hope that other F&RS do not join this ridiculous circus. There must be an alternative way. What next? Higher pay for BAME and female staff? Better pensions? Maybe a BAME Bonus (I worked with a guy who was Iranian/Russian. Would he get two bonuses?)

Let me clarify for those who are hard of reading, I am not anti BAME/female recruitment, or special recruitment days, pre learning or targeted advertising. But lowering pass marks is dangerous and perhaps the thing end of the wedge, undoing decades of fanatic inclusion work by many. I am really disappointed about this policy

[OscarTango]

I don't think anyone with any verbal reasoning (something extensively tested during recruitment these days) would take what you're saying as racist Messy and we shouldn't have to put those disclaimers in. 

I have zero issue with targeted action to attract minorities. Ultimately the fire service is an arm of the state. It's important that minorities have the opportunity to be included and take part in the running of a public service wether that be the fire service, DVLA, or the Home Office. Governments are on a slippery slope if certain stratas of society become alienated or don't see them as looking out for their interests. 

In this case though, the gains from having a few extra minority recruits would be outweighed by the demoralization of your existing workforce. 

By going down this road, you don't appear inclusive and concerned with equality of opportunity: you reinforce to people the image of government institutions being biased and somehow rigged, which is what puts off minorities from taking part in the first place.

[Matt]

I think many Brigades are scoring candidates well that they want that fit into the categories they need to fill and tick a box with when they are not the best choice in my opinion from what I have seen of late around the country.

At the end of the day you cannot force someone of say none male white category to come join a job if they don't want to and of course they will never look good statistically but if no one of the other categories wants to join you cannot force them.  Lets also not take them on if they do not meet the criteria.  It's all about ticking boxes these days.

[Aspire]

Please tell us what you have seen, that you refer to in your first sentence Matt? 

This subject comes up here every now and then and people forget to speak facts. Well, it is a fact that of around 39,000 Firefighters in the UK, just 1,200 are BAME, so the ‘preferential treatment’ obviously isn’t working is it?!

Looking at LFB specifically, with all of our progressive recruiting techniques and ‘preferential scoring’ 🙄, the white male still gets 8.5 out of every 10 jobs, and there is certainly no lack of BAME applicants as there may be in some areas of the country.

Another thing that winds me up when this subject comes up is that nobody has actually stated an understanding about why the Fire Service ACTUALLY benefits from representing the community it serves other than saying we should represent the community we serve. Please do yourself a favour and find out why this supports one of your services key objectives, rather than say it’s a tick box exercise to appease the grown ups.

That S**t Show of a paper, The Daily Mail comes up with a sensationalised story and, as expected, I have been reading all sorts on Facebook, but to come here and have people actually believe it’s true is disappointing. 

Maybe I should start a thread called ‘Jobs for the boys’, about how the white male contingent have helped each other along, whilst holding back the black man; I bet that’d go down like a lead brick in the sea! Naturally, that is not my overarching view, but it has happened and is a viable opposite example of what is being said here.

I am happy that we have an arena here where we can discuss contentious issues like this, but let’s just do our homework first.

I speak as a Black Station Manager with 8yrs in, who has spent his whole career being told I must be on the Graduate Scheme, Targeted Development Scheme or only made it because I’m black; rarely because I have worked really hard to be good at my job and have had some fantastic officers, white & black, to learn from. So please be mindful with some of these responses, how it may belittle the achievements of others.

‘Best person for the job’ is one of my most loathed sentences when talking about this. I’m sure we can all agree, we’ve seen terrible white/black/male/female firefighters in our services, the fact is, the best people do not always get in, that’s the sad reality. But for some reason, when it’s non white male, the conspiracy theorists are immediately there...

[Messyshaw]

3 hours ago, Aspire said:

I speak as a Black Station Manager with 8yrs in, who has spent his whole career being told I must be on the Graduate Scheme, Targeted Development Scheme or only made it because I’m black; rarely because I have worked really hard to be good at my job and have had some fantastic officers, white & black, to learn from. So please be mindful with some of these responses, how it may belittle the achievements of others.

That is exactly what I was referring to in my post above. The West Mids  'lowering the hurdle' approach feeds the racist stereotypes and implies it is the recruitment selection process that is having a negative impact on them recruiting more from under represented groups., when there clearly are other reasons.

If I was black and made my own way into the job by sheer bloody hard work, I would not be pleased with others around me saying 'You have had it easy'. 

I note that Danni Cotton, when asked at a public committee hearing in the last few days whether the LFB were considering following West Mids approach , she gave a very simple answer "No".  Thank goodness for that!

[Noddy]

Hat’s off to Aspire great post.

And yes people need to check the facts first.  What is suggested in the press is positive discrimination which is illegal.  Does anyone think my brigade would be daft enough to break the law? 

[HoldFast]

The Daily Mail always have and will try their hardest to divide the people of this country and unfortunately a lot of people buy into what they say. They claim to be writing in favour of equality by pedalling the story yet are clearly and deliberately stirring things up in an attempt to achieve the exact opposite. It’s no surprise that they also continue to intentionally use the term “firemen” when collectively referring to firefighters. Let’s not forget it’s people like Katie Hopkins that fill their columns.  

[Carefree]

Good post Aspire.

Nobody will ever win over ignorance.

[TandA]

I didn’t need to read much of the article to know it was crap.  Un-named “senior source” equals no way of tracing the source, no denying the quotes and in other words made up or based on misquotes and snippets taken way out of context.  As others have said, positive action is illegal, do you really think that WMFRS would be breaking the law like that? Just look for a second at modern recruitment procedures.  Often those marking the applications just have an applicant number, no name or other info on the candidate. Makes it kind of hard to engage in blatant positive discrimination like that suggested.

[Noddy]

11 hours ago, Lee88 said:

Absolutely agree with you becile but I can imagine people will want to level the playing field if it’s not been level to begin with 

I digress But for the record, it is a level playing field in West Mids.  Back on topic 👍

[Lee88]

Not from what I’ve seen buddy 👍

[HoldFast]

Don’t believe everything you read in the media. Just saying.

[Lee88]

Most of the time I don’t pal but in my opinion if I had to hazard a guess at this one I’d guess it’s true 

[Lumie]

@Lee88 if it’s true mate then all of the recruits would be BME and female, no? 

When I’m actuality, I’m currently sitting on my biscuit break in a training school surrounded by 12 white british males and 1 Brazilian female. The courses we’ve seen over the last 8 weeks have been mostly male, mostly white and mostly british. 

As others have said, I don’t think there’s any favouritism in the firefighter application process - the one with the best application form and the best at getting through each recruitment hurdle is he or she who gets the job.

[Lee88]

No of course not if it’s only just started happening recently? Anyway I hope I’m proved wrong and it hasn’t 👍

[Carl]

The FBU are investigating the claims here. 

[Aspire]

5 hours ago, Lee88 said:

Most of the time I don’t pal but in my opinion if I had to hazard a guess at this one I’d guess it’s true 

What do you base this ‘opinion’ on?

There’s a lot of ‘what i’ve seen’, but no elaboration from those, funny that. More likely a case of what you’ve heard and a failure to go and seek facts results in your belief!

[Luminoki]

The big worry right now is that many will doubt themselves on their own abilities ( not me, im big enough and ugly enough to not care ) and it therefore belittles the acheivement theyve made. I dont believe anything the daily mail writes, for a start i know its poor reporting because they didnt report how much the “sources” house is worth!

[Lee88]

I’ll tell you what I base my opinion on - my brain. Simple as that! From what I HAVE SEEN (e mails, maybe true maybe false) and also what I’ve been told from friends who are serving and who I won’t name for obvious reasons. Not necessarily about this thing in question but about all manner of things what have and do go on in the service to make sure boxes are ticked. Some of it surprised me some of it didn’t and some of it just plain and simply made me laugh. That and the way the country has gone to far with political correctness have all come together in my brain to say to me you know what it wouldn’t surprise me if it’s true although I hope it isn’t for the sake of the people that have actually cracked it like luminoki has said above, I’d be gutted that I’d not done it on merrit when I thought I had. Non of what I have said is  meant in any jest just my opinion on it 👍

[HoldFast]

In which areas do you think the country has gone too far with political correctness Lee? I have heard statements like that before and they are almost always backed up with “that’s just my opinion” as though it somehow justifies the comment or serves as an attempt to dodge any unexpected confrontation.

[Noddy]

Are you an employee of WMFS Lee? 

[Keith]

I think we need to be careful here, particularly as the facts seem to be thin on the ground. Bear in mind, whilst everyone is entitled to their opinion and free to express it, please do it in a respectful manner. 

[Aspire]

Imagine all of these emails Lee has seen and sound bites heard from his mates that are serving. Yet only 5% of the UK FRS staff are from ethnic minorities; the figures definitely support the position that illegal preferential practice is taking place 🙄

[Lee88]

I can see where it’s going so I’m going to leave it here don’t want to fall out with anyone, I think the last thing that should come out of all of this is for people to be turning on each other. In response to holdfast  like I said the country so all areas. I meant it as society in general. Yes your right that IS my opinion! When I joined this forum (great by the way) I was under the impression you were aloud one, is this not the case? I’m not justifying or dodging anything or anyone I’ll debate until the cows come home but as Keith said probably best of if we all wait until facts come to light. I’ll say it again - I hope I’m wrong👍