What is Positive Action?

The tragic death of George Floyd in the US this year has underlined the importance of racial equality and representation in policing across the world. Positive Action is one of the key measures to address this challenge in UK policing, in order to transform the make up of policing into the future and deliver the change that our diverse communities rightly expect.

Positive Action is a range of measures and initiatives (under the Equality Act 2010) that organisations can lawfully take to actively encourage people from communities that are under-represented to join us. It can only be used where participation (e.g. employment, promotion etc) is disproportionately low, and the action taken must be proportionate to be lawful. Both Dorset Police and Devon and Cornwall Police apply Positive Action in respect of ethnicity, gender, LGBT+, disability and age.

Positive Action is not positive discrimination, and once a job candidate starts a recruitment process, they must pass the same assessments, at the same levels as all other candidates, and on their own merits. In it not about lowering the bar for any candidates, rather, delivering a level playing field, and removing barriers to applying, before the start of the recruitment process.

Why is Positive Action Needed for Black and Other Ethnic Minorities in both Devon & Cornwall Police and Dorset Police?

In UK policing, ethnic minorities are often referred to as BAME: Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic people.

Dorset Police and Devon and Cornwall Police are both significantly under-represented for ethnic minority/BAME officers and staff. At the last (2011) census ethnic minorities accounted for 4% of the population in Dorset, yet only 1.6% of the Dorset Police workforce are BAME/ethnic minorities. Similarly, in Devon & Cornwall, 2.4% of the population were ethnic minority, where only 1.1.% of the workforce are currently ethnic minority officers or staff.

In supporting a more diverse, representative workforce both forces aim to gain a wider range of skills and experience, have a better understanding of diverse communities and build confidence in all communities that they are part of policing in their area.

Therefore, as both forces have less than half the ethnic minority officers and staff they need to be fully representative of their communities, they are taking active steps using Positive Action to address this:

What are Devon & Cornwall Police and Dorset Police doing under Positive Action?

Both forces are actively pursuing fairer representation, from ethnic minority (and other) communities through:

• Diverse Group Engagement
  The Positive Action Team visits and/or engages with over 80 ethnic minority community groups including Afro-Caribbean and African groups, mosques, (Polish, Korean and Brazilian) churches and schools in ethnically-diverse areas, to publicise police jobs and break down barriers in these communities. Before COVID-19, the Team has run police station workshop visits for ethnic minority and other candidates, and through COVID-19 has commenced a series of webinars to continue to attract job applicants from these communities in a COVID-secure way.
• One-To-One Support to Job Candidates
  Positive Action Team run telephone assessments calls every week for diverse members of the community who are interested in joining the police family, as an officer or as one of hundreds of different police staff and volunteer roles. Candidates have their own candidate manager to support them through the pre-application process. They provide bespoke support, including where appropriate, a newly-developed, 8-week online Positive Action Support Programme for police officer candidates.
• Black Police Association/support groups
  Positive Action Team signpost new joiners to the police staff associations including those representing the Black Police Association in the forces, to ensure all staff have mutual support and welfare from these bodies.