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Dying on the job - Racism and risk at work

Report type
Research and reports
Issue date
Conclusion

This report brings into focus the reality of BME workers’ lived experience during the coronavirus crisis and the way that racism shapes the negative experiences that endanger their health, safety and wellbeing. We believe that this is a key factor in the disproportionate number of deaths of BME workers during the pandemic. The report also shows how the institutional racism and discriminatory treatment that BME workers experience has intensified during the crisis.

The TUC believes that the most damaging of these factors are that:

  • BME workers are overrepresented in the lowest paid occupations and are far more likely to be in precarious jobs than white workers. As a result, many BME workers may have felt that they had little choice but to work during the crisis (even where there was no access to PPE or other protections) because of the insecure nature of their jobs and lack of access to full employment rights.
     
  • The experience of not having complaints of racism taken seriously or feeling that there may be negative consequences of raising complaints about racism has resulted in BME workers feeling that they have little power to affect their working environment. Many of the comments from BME workers in the report demonstrate that whilst they were aware of being disproportionately exposed to dangerous working situations during the coronavirus crisis, they didn’t feel that they could do anything about it.
     
  • Racism in the workplace has led to BME workers being more likely to be assigned the worst tasks and most dangerous jobs in the workplace. A number of BME workers reported that they were deployed into frontline jobs while white colleagues were kept out of danger. Even when it was possible for them to be furloughed during the crisis BME workers complained that their employers insisted that they remain in the workplace. These experiences highlight the reality of BME workers not being valued as people or as workers.
     
  • The inadequate provision of PPE has had a major impact on BME workers and their ability to protect themselves from Covid-19. A recurring theme in responses to our call for evidence was BME workers reporting feeling forced to work in dangerous situations without PPE where white colleagues were not or that the provision of PPE was discriminatory, even when it was available.
     
  • The failure to conduct risk assessments to identify measures that could be put in place to reduce the risk of exposure to the virus was repeatedly highlighted by BME workers. This resulted in BME workers with underlying health conditions being unnecessarily exposed to the virus.

The TUC believes that it is essential for the voices of BME workers to be listened to and that their experience inform the decisions about what action needs to be taken to tackle racism within the workplace. If these experiences are ignored then, as in the past, the policies and practices that are implemented will not result in the transformative change that we need.

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