Sad indictment on Games inclusion

DEAR Editor, As a Birmingham citizen with origins in the Commonwealth I read with interest those concerns raised by the Birmingham Mela faith group that the Commonwealth Games does not live up to its inclusivity claims or reflect the broad diversity of Birmingham’s communities (Post, April 9).

The response from both Birmingham

2022 and Birmingham City Council is to be expected.

The council made many promises to black communities during the backdrop of the London 2012 Olympics around inclusion, diversity and legacy after the games, but nothing tangible and long lasting materialised.

Fast forward to 2022 and we are in a worse place. Remembering the events surrounding the George Floyd death, we thought at last black and ethnic minorities would be truly and directly engaged in major events such as the Games – only to be hugely disappointed yet again. The row that ignited in 2020 over the Games’ failure to ensure its leadership was diverse simply triggered the reaction to appoint a couple of black faces to token positions with no resources or ability to both influence and drive change in the organisation.

These token appointees were then sent out to sell a message to the black communities that the Games organisation wanted to be inclusive and diverse, when at the same time these communities, by the procedures involved, continued to be locked out of the procurement contracts process for the goods and services contracts.

The response from Birmingham 2022 simply seeks to put a spin on those very serious concerns and only serves to provide nonanswers to those very important questions raised by Birmingham Mela and other organisations in the community.

Birmingham 2022 will parade percentages on what it does for other historically excluded groups in an effort to camouflage its failure to deliver on race equality and diversity issues.

Maybe they can better explain why they feel that the Birmingham 2022 festival is a shining example of inclusivity and creativity in the context of the added economic value and the future economic development of the visible minority communities of Birmingham.

The sad fact is that, as with the case of the London 2012 Olympics, Birmingham and its leadership talk a lot about, diversity, inclusion and legacy but fail to deliver anything tangible.

So here we are once again with Birmingham having a golden opportunity to show leadership and do more than just ‘talk the talk’ about inclusion and diversity.

But, as Birmingham Mela and other groups have rightly highlighted, this opportunity has been translated into failure due to a lack of required structures from the outset to ensure these matters were taken seriously.

It’s is a very sad indictment for the city and the Birmingham 2022 organisation.

Athelston Sealey OBE Handsworth

Birmingham