Valuing Equality
Written by Musmirah_Shahzada on Friday, December 1, 2006 11:26
King's Fund paper produced for the Race for Health National Conference
The NHS is committed to race equality as an employer, and as a provider has promised ‘to do more to meet the particular needs of black and minority ethnic groups’ in England. This includes a commitment to addressing underlying inequalities in health, inequities in access to services and variations in patient experience. There is also an overarching commitment to respond to the linguistic, cultural and religious diversity of all patients.
The main drivers for action to date have been legal and moral. Recent evidence suggests that progress towards race equality has been uncertain, with many trusts apparently failing to meet their legal obligations in full and the existence of wide variations in activity to improve services for people from BME groups across the NHS. Previous research has found that resource constraints are the most commonly cited reasons for inaction, suggesting that addressing the needs of BME groups is seen as a net cost to organisations.
Written by the King's Fund in conjunction with the Race for Health programme, this paper looks at whether, in addition to the legal and moral drivers, a ‘business case’ can be made to promote race equality. A business case would hinge on the argument that net benefits would accrue to organisations over the short to medium term as a result of investing in interventions aimed at BME staff or patients. These benefits could be direct, in the form of financial gains or savings, or indirect, such as reputational gains.
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