BAME community in UK worst hit by job cuts
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Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) workers have suffered the most in terms of job-loss during the pandemic, according to new analysis from the Trades Union Congress (TUC).
The number of BAME people in employment
has dropped 5.3 per cent in the year to September 2020 according to the recent report from the TUC. This compares to a 0.2 per cent drop in employment among white people.
The number of BAME workers in employment has dropped by 26 times more than the drop in white workers since the pandemic began.
TUC general secretary Frances O’Grady blamed systemic racism for this drop.
“BME [Black and minority ethnic] workers have borne the brunt of the economic impact of this pandemic,” she said in January following the release of the TUC report.
“In every industry, where jobs have gone, BME people have been more likely to be made unemployed.
“When BME workers have held onto their jobs, we know that they are more likely to be working in low-paid,
insecure jobs that put them at greater risk from the virus.”
Evidence from the TUC shows that BAME groups are more likely than white people to work in insecure jobs - that is, roles that are likely to result in unemployment in the future.
BAME women are most affected, with an unemployment rate of 8.8 per cent between July and September 2020 according to the TUC.
White men by contrast are least affected with an unemployment rate of 5 per cent and an employment rate of almost 20 per cent higher than BAME women, during the same period.
The pandemic is not the first time this inequality has been highlighted. Government statistics from 2019 show that only 66 per cent of the BAME community were employed, compared with 78 per cent of white people.
Under the Equality Act 2010, companies are not allowed to discriminate against people at work in relation to their race, and other factors.
Patrick Roach, who chairs the TUC’s anti-racism task force, said: “During previous economic downturns, [BAME] workers have been ‘first out and last in’.
“The government needs to address the causes and effects of structural racism and set out a national recovery plan that works for everyone.”
