Britain’s equality watchdog has become “an agent of the Conservative government”, refusing to countenance its staff speaking up on race, an employment tribunal has heard.
Preeti Kathrecha, formerly a senior associate and race protected-characteristic lead at Britain’s equality watchdog, is suing the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) at a Manchester employment tribunal, alleging racial discrimination and unfair dismissal.
She claims she was “punished and silenced” for doing her job by speaking up about race and was told never to use the term “institutional racism”. Kathrecha, who is claiming constructive dismissal, says she was psychologically exhausted when she left the EHRC in July 2021. The watchdog denies all the claims.
In her witness statement, Kathrecha, who began giving evidence on Wednesday, said: “The commission, which was supposed to be independent and impartial on race and other forms of discrimination, was politicised on some areas, such as race (and, more recently, the trans debate).
“By politicised I mean that the board increasingly acted as an agent of the Conservative government and against parties or organisations which the government were opposed to, or were in conflict with, rather than impartially and independently, and in accordance with its statutory duties … It is being used as a political weapon in a cultural race war.”
As a consequence, Kathrecha said, evidence of institutional racism was ignored in EHRC reports into the NHS and social care, higher education, the Met police, the coronavirus pandemic and the Home Office’s hostile environment policy and ensuing the Windrush scandal.
She also alleges that the watchdog was wanting in its response to the racist murder of George Floyd and the Black Lives Matter demonstrations that followed.
Her statement said: “Whereas the respondent felt empathy, compassion and provided support for its female staff (mostly white) after the [Sarah] Everard tragedy, it entirely ignored the welfare of BAME (Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic) staff after the George Floyd racist incident …
“The JCHR (joint committee on human rights) response and those of every other anti-racism organisation and even most corporates and Premier football clubs were far more committed and insightful than the stony silence we faced at the respondent.”
She cited a 2021 survey which she said found that only 22% of staff at the EHRC agreed that it promoted workforce diversity and equality and only 6.6% believed that the board upheld commission values and behaviours.
Kathrecha said there was a lack of BAME representation in senior roles and the watchdog refused to set targets for addressing the deficit because it did not want to attract criticism for not meeting them.
She also claimed that she was asked to sign off the executive summary of the inquiry into antisemitism in the Labour party, without being allowed access to the underlying evidence, because the EHRC wanted the signoff from a BAME employee. She refused to do so, describing the request as “upsetting, disrespectful and humiliating”.
The EHRC has described Kathrecha’s claim as “dealing with political matters not relating to the respondent”. It denies that she has been discriminated against on the grounds of her race, harassed or victimised and claims she was not constructively dismissed but resigned in order to take up another job.
The tribunal continues.
