Anti-Racist Wales Social Housing Baseline Survey: Key Findings
Today, we have published the results of the social housing sector baseline survey which aimed to gather data in areas including staff diversity, the development of organisational anti-racism plans and take-up of training.
In June 2022 Welsh Government published its Anti-racist Wales Action Plan (ARWAP), setting out the actions it will take to make Wales an Anti-racist nation. The plan’s vision is to make meaningful and measurable changes to the lives of Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic people by tackling racism.
Actions related to housing include:
• Increasing staff and board diversity
• Anti-racism training
• Production of anti-racism delivery plans
• Improvements in data collection, analysis, usage and publication
• Improvements in how racism, including hate crime is reported and tackled
• Improvements to communication and engagement with ethnic minority people
• Meeting information, advice and advocacy needs
• Ensuring anti-racism is an integral part of transformation of homelessness services
• Other actions
More information on actions specific to the housing sector can be found in Tai Pawb’s Anti-racism Toolkit.
The survey sought to gather data from registered social landlords, local authorities, and third sector housing support organisations to provide baseline view of selected areas within ARWAP where data was scarce, namely:
• Diversity of staff
• The extent to which organisations have developed anti-racism delivery plans and
whether these are published
• The extent to which staff and board have been trained on racism
• The ability of social housing providers to analyse housing conditions data according
to household characteristics (including race and ethnicity)
In addition to the above the survey also sought to explore barriers to implementation of ARWAP experienced by the housing sector and views on further support needed.
Some of the key findings of the results of our baseline survey are:
- Ethnic diversity of all housing sector staff was representative: 6.4% of staff were from ethnic minority backgrounds compared to 6.3% of Welsh population (Census 2021). However, ethnic diversity amongst managerial staff was low at 0.8%, followed by senior management at 1.2%. Representation amongst non-managerial staff was the highest at 5.9%. Ethnic diversity of boards in 2022 generally reflected population diversity, with 7% of board members from Black, Asian or ethnic minority backgrounds.
- By July 2023, 39% people working in the housing sector had received training on anti-racism in the preceding two years.
- More than half of organisations with housing stock said their stock condition data can be broken down by protected characteristics.
- Nearly 80% of organisations had some form of anti-racism plan, either standalone or as part of their Equality, Diversity and Inclusion plans; 30% had published them online.
You can read the full report here:
Anti-Racist Wales: A Baseline Survey of the Social Housing Sector
Cymru Wrth-hiliol: Arolwyg Sylfaenol o’r Sector Tai Cymdeithasol
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