As Buckingham Palace conducts a ‘diversity review’, Hardeep Matharu explores how the focus on ‘opportunity’, minority recruitment drives and Boris Johnson’s ‘most diverse’ Cabinet actually sidesteps the issue of tackling systemic racism in Britain today
In the aftermath of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s interview with Oprah Winfrey – in which the couple said that concerns had been raised within the Royal Family about “how dark” their unborn son’s skin might be – news emerged that Buckingham Palace is conducting a “diversity review” which may include the appointment of a ‘diversity chief’.
According to the Mail on Sunday, it began before the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s comments were made and will be a “major drive” in collaboration with ethnic minority people, the disabled and those from the LGBT community. The Palace “is looking at new ways of approaching all issues of diversity within the royal households,” the BBC reported.
How this begins to tackle, or opens up a wider public conversation about, the systemic issues of racism and white supremacy embedded in our culture, politics and society – of which the Royal Family is the result and ultimate expression – is doubtful. Increasing ‘diversity’ does not, in itself, tackle racism when the actual issue is a cultural and historic identity in which racism is embedded. To the contrary, it can act as a smokescreen.
What is concerning is not the issue of diversity per se but how it is increasingly being used to sidestep the systematic problems of race in Britain – which are being voiced more loudly and regularly than at any point in the past two decades.
How a diversity chief in Buckingham Palace would, in any meaningful way, help tackle the systemic nature of British racism must be questioned – given that it cannot be an issue from which the Royal Family is immune. On the contrary, for all of us living in modern Britain, deep-rooted ideas of race, class, hierarchy and identity are the very water we swim in – even if we are not conscious of this. And, as the head of state, the Queen and her family are meant to be the quintessential representation of the type of country we are.
But, in its response to Harry and Meghan’s interview, the Royal Family made clear that it would not be using this uncomfortable moment for the institution to lead or contribute to any wider societal discussion about what systemic racism is or how it manifests. The issues raised by the Duke and Duchess of Sussex would be “addressed by the family privately,” it said.
If the monarchy can openly champion issues such as the stigma around mental health, support for former members of the armed services or the issue of racism in football, why can it not do the same for systemic racism beyond mere mentions of diversity?
The telling nature of this omission was not dispelled by Prince William’s simplistic assertion that “we’re very much not a racist family”. Four years earlier, Princess Michael of Kent turned up at a Christmas lunch attended by Meghan Markle with a blackamoor brooch pinned to her coat.
Harry and Meghan’s interview also saw the couple label coverage of Meghan by the British tabloids as racist and speak of the “invisible contract” that exists between a monarchy fearful of unfavourable news reports and the right-wing press.
In a rapid response, the then executive director of the Society of Editors Ian Murray announced that “the UK media is not bigoted and will not be swayed from its vital role holding the rich and powerful to account” – despite a number of its members disagreeing. Murray later stepped down.
In response to his statement, more than 160 journalists of colour signed an open letter saying that the organisation not only needed to recruit more minority reporters but also “to start an open and constructive discussion about the best way to prevent racist coverage in future”.
While getting more people from varied backgrounds into newsrooms is vital – and not just at entry level, but in top-level positions where all the key decisions are made around commissioning and editorial positioning – this in itself cannot be the solution.
As Brian Cathcart has observed in these pages: “If we see this dispute reverting to the discussion of measures to improve the recruitment of ethnic minority journalists, without firm action against racist journalism, we will know that those who protested have capitulated. That talk is cheap and, in the past, it has been a mere fig leaf to cover inaction… it is right and vital that the news media employ minority journalists and action must be taken to drive that change – but this must not be used to distract attention away from actual racist content appearing every day and every week in our national news media.”
Diversity But Disproportionality
Nearly 30 years after the racist murder of Stephen Lawrence in south-east London, systemic issues of racism within the criminal justice system remain – despite politically-lauded recruitment drives.
In the wake of the teenager’s death, Sir William Macpherson found that the Metropolitan Police’s handling of the murder had been “institutionally racist”. He defined this as a “collective failure of an organisation to provide an appropriate and professional service to people because of their colour, culture or ethnic origin… in processes, attitudes and thoughtlessness and racist stereotyping which disadvantages minority ethnic people”.
When her two daughters were found murdered in a Wembley Park last June, Mina Smallman said that the police did not immediately respond when they were reported missing because they were “making assumptions”.
“I knew instantly why they didn’t care,” she said. “They didn’t care because they looked at my daughter’s address and thought they knew who she was. A black woman who lives on a council estate.”
A spokesperson for the Independent Office for Police Conduct confirmed to Byline Times that an “investigation into how the Metropolitan Police Service handled a number of calls from the family and friends of Nicole Smallman and Bibaa Henry who were concerned about their whereabouts between 6-7 June, remains ongoing and it is following further lines of enquiry” and that “one officer has been informed that their conduct is under investigation following an indication they may not have progressed these reports appropriately”.
When told of the allegations that two Met Police officers took “inappropriate” photographs of the sisters’ bodies at the murder scene, which were then shared with others in a WhatsApp group, Mina Smallman said it made her think of the “Deep South when they used to lynch people and you would see smiling faces around a hanging dead body”.