MPs furious Civil Service has kept ‘unconscious bias’ training
THE Civil Service has defied ministers to keep mandatory “unconscious bias” training despite the Government scrapping it a year ago for being ineffective.
Some 170,000 officials had completed the training, which alerts people to their apparent hidden prejudices, at a cost of £370,000 to the taxpayer, but MPs said that it only served to enrich woke consultancy services.
It prompted Julia Lopez, the culture minister, to tell the Commons in December 2020: “Ministers have concluded that unconscious bias training does not achieve its intended aims. It will therefore be phased out.”
But more than a year later, it remains in operation across Whitehall departments, materials leaked to The Sunday Telegraph show.
Now furious MPs are writing to the Cabinet Office demanding it ends “this costly and undesirable kind of indoctrination”. The current course, seen by The Telegraph, says: “If we all do this, we’ll be able to appreciate the skills, talents and potential of others, and build a diverse workforce.”
A Whitehall source said: “It is deeply disturbing that the Civil Service diversity industry operates completely free from ministerial oversight – so much so that they felt they could subvert and sabotage a commitment a Cabinet Office minister made to Parliament.”
The course goes on to say that “there are four topics on unconscious bias in your mandatory learning”, one of which covers religion and ethics. A workplace scenario is provided of a Christmas tree being taken down as it causes offence.
In the roleplay, staff are told: “Elaine, my manager, told me I’d have to take the Christmas tree down, as she was worried it might offend Aaron, who is Jewish and Mo, who is a Muslim.” Another slide then says: “Don’t assume that everyone from a particular religious background practises their religion in exactly the same way.”
Sir John Hayes, the chairman of the Common Sense Group of 50 Tory MPs, said he would be “writing to the Cabinet Office immediately, making sure that every government department is told that if this is going on, it’s going on without ministerial permission”.
“There are clearly elements within the administration that haven’t yet got the message. It is vital that no civil servant is obliged to endure this costly and undesirable kind of indoctrination.
“If this training wasn’t sinister, it would be comic. It’s Fawlty Towers meets Whitehall. It is bizarre and preposterous. It also has a corrosive and corrupting effect because if you tell blatant lies often enough, some people get conned into believing that.”
A government spokesman said: “All standalone mandatory unconscious bias training was removed in December 2020 in line with ministerial direction. There are references to unconscious bias training within the range of legacy diversity and inclusion courses currently available to civil servants. We are in the process of updating all our diversity and inclusion offerings.”