Examination of Witnesses (Questions 220-228)
MS ALISON
SEABROOKE AND
MS MELANIE
BOWLES
22 APRIL 2008
Q220 Chair: The initiative comes
from groups out there deciding whether they wish to put an application
in?
Ms Seabrooke: Yes.
Q221 Chair: You do not go out and
say there is a need in this particular area for this particular
activity?
Ms Seabrooke: No, we do not. If
we felt that we had expected applications to come from a particular
region or sub-region and we have not received any, we would look
at that, and certainly when you look at the distribution of funding
as well, we want to make sure that there is a good cover from
region to region. We would be concerned if we only got applications
from one particular part of the country.
Q222 Anne Main: You talk about tensions
between migrants and the settled community. I would like to hear
a little more about the settled community because one of the things
that came loud and clear to us was that it was not that there
was any form of anti-migrant view, but members of the ethnic settled
community felt that the pace of changes were very difficult for
them to adapt to the rapidity at which their community was changing.
How do you react to the pace of change? A lot of communities said
to us that they felt things were lagging behind. Do you react
to the pace of change and how have you done it?
Ms Bowles: The proactive part
of our work as the Community Development Foundation is not so
much waiting for the grant funding, it is identifying practice
issues, thorny difficult problems in communities and community
development practice—and cohesion and conflict is one of
the areas that we have been proactive in and looking at.
Q223 Anne Main: What do you think
is causing the conflict? You did mention that you accept there
are tensions and conflicts. Would you like to say what you think
is causing the conflicts in communities?
Ms Bowles: We ran a seminar about
cohesion and conflict and we brought together community leaders,
activists, councillors and community development workers to think
about conflict between communities, conflicts within communities
and conflicts between communities and authorities, and the primary
source of conflict that people identified was resource competition
and perceived unfairness, so the sense that a settled community
feel that they have been badly served, they have experienced disadvantage
or they feel that they have been underserved by public services.
The perception then arises that new migrants are receiving preferential
treatment. That was the primary cause of conflict.
Q224 Anne Main: Did you get any sense
that it was the rapidity by which those things were happening
that you have outlined rather than just the fact that they were
happening?
Ms Bowles: I am sure that it is
the rapidity with which it is happening and the resource lag;
I am sure that that it is the case. The concerns are probably
legitimate that people feel that they have been underserved by
public authorities but the hostility and tension tends to be focused
on the incomer rather than on the authorities that may not have
served the settled community so well in the past. That is where
we are linking the cohesion with empowerment, that if people feel
that their participation in communities and community organisations,
in community debates, discussions, dialogues will have an impact
on resourcing decisions and on service provision, then they will
participate. If they feel that their participation will not alter
anything, then they will be disaffected and more likely to exacerbate
cohesion, tension problems and aim conflicts at other people in
their communities.
Q225 Chair: What further do you think
the Government should be doing to help community cohesion?
Ms Seabrooke: We would like to
see a cross-government community development strategy which recognises
the particular skills that are required in terms of bringing people
together, preparing both the receiving community in terms of migrant
communities and the local public sector in terms of what they
may expect and the difficult questions they may need to address.
We would like to see the recognition of the certain skills that
are embodied within what we call real community development but
it is what is actually being expected of every public sector frontline
worker at the moment. We have quite a lot of problems in terms
of the measurement aspect because the drive is for very objective
measurement rather than some subjective incremental developments
that take quite a long time in terms of building trust within
communities; that is trust within the public sector, the communities
themselves and the individual citizens and then the trust between
the public sector and those various groups. That is quite a long
process and what we have found is that you just get a good dialogue
going within a community but, if it is short-term funded and resourced,
then it disappears as soon as it has started.
Q226 Chair: Can I touch on one area
where you seem to have a difference of opinion with the Commission
on Integration and Cohesion which is this issue about single identity
groups. Why is it that you think that single identity groups can
play a positive role in cohesion while the CIC seems to think
the opposite?
Ms Seabrooke: Partly from the
evidence we have from the programmes that have been delivered
about the nature of the organisations that may have a single group
identity, but the number of different identity groups that they
actually work with or bridge between, the make-up of those single
identity groups may be quite varied, although they fall within
a particular category. Our concern with that recommendation was
that it would provide a very narrow focus if people are unable
to interpret the breadth of the single identity work, then it
could mean that some of the resources to very marginalised groups—groups
that legitimately need space to work within their own identity
group before they can move on to make those bridges with other
identities and communities—all of that needs to be recognised.
Ms Bowles: The term itself is
a bit misleading. Single identity groups usually comprise multiple
and complex identities within that group. We have experienced
through successive regeneration programmes that people need to
belong to something in a community in order to become involved
in wider community level debates and discussions. People would
not put themselves forward to be representative on a panel if
they did not belong to a community organisation and have some
sense of belonging to a community. We are applying that to the
single identity issue as well that, if people have a stake in
a community, they are more likely to engage in wider discussions
about future aspirations of that community.
Q227 Anne Main: In respect of needing
to belong within a community and seek an identity, that actually
flies in the face of what we were told by the community groups
who said the exact opposite; that by actually focusing on single
groups in some way shape or form you are enshrining the difference
rather than integrating people into the community. Do you not
have any concerns at all that that may be part of what you are
doing?
Ms Bowles: The second part of
what we wrote about—the single identity funding issue—is
that it is important to look at the activity itself. If you are
saying that single identity groups can be a force for community
cohesion, you look at what activity they are proposing to do and
whether you think that is an outward-looking, cohesion-making
activity, or whether you think it is something that is insular
and putting up barriers.
Q228 Andrew George: It is all terribly
theoretical the line that you have used so far. Give an example
of work with a single identity group. How do you define what that
single identity group is and what are the benefits of working
with them?
Ms Bowles: The controversy that
has followed the recommendation about single identity groups is
exactly around that issue of what is a single identity group?
If local authorities have decided you are a single identity group,
hence you are not eligible for funding, that is why the kind of
uproar has started. Typically it might be a women's group, and
it might be an Asian women's group, which sounds like a single
identity, but if you can imagine the different nationalities,
religions, different immigration, legal status that might be involved
in an Asian women's group, you are talking about lots of identities.
Ms Seabrooke: And the need for
those women to meet because of their particular beliefs that they
have to have that grouping and it cannot be expanded into other
areas. They would just not want to meet. It is that first stage
of integration.
Chair: Thank you very much indeed.
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