News Story
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When we made our original statement two months ago we identified that our record keeping had not been good enough to publish #pulluporshutup statistics in response to Theatre Action’s campaign. We have rerun reports and are now able to publish three years of data and include it above.
The information is not complete but nevertheless shows that we have a long way to go as an organisation if we want to redress the imbalance across our workforce and work. We know that representation is not enough and also that we won’t achieve positive inclusion and representation until we address systemic racism. Since we last wrote we have embarked on this journey in the following ways;
- We continue to have weekly anti-racism group meetings. They are staff-led, and staff are supported to incorporate its work into their working hours.
- We have formed a separate anti-racism action group with sub-groups looking at specific areas of the company’s activities. The action group and sub-groups operate along the same principles of consensus decision-making. They include members from the leadership team but are non-hierarchical. These groups are looking at specific actions the company can take to develop and embed an Anti-Racism action plan across all our work.
- We are currently focusing more detailed learning in the following areas: recruitment and career progression, casting, safeguarding, artist development programmes, production programme, education and outreach, collection/auditing/evaluation of data, dramaturgy and gate-keeping, policy and communications.
- We have scheduled a first session of Anti-Racism and Allyship training with our full staff cohort.
- We have scheduled Unconscious Bias training with our full Board.
- We are working to improve the current and upcoming experience Black artists and artists of colour have when they work with us through consultation with industry/anti-racism specialists, and the adoption of emerging recommendations from Black artists and artists of colour within the industry.
- We acknowledge that we are a majority white, and white lead organisation so while we are educating ourselves and working actively to transform the company we are ensuring that we are continuously seeking out the expertise of professionals who are leaders in anti-racism and organisational change.
- We have therefore already appointed a specialist anti-racist consultant to help us hold a space for third party complaints and concerns with our conduct in regard to race both historically and for anything that comes up in the future.
We recognise that this is just the beginning and that our work will need to be ongoing. Even though we previously identified this as an objective, progress has not been fast or significant enough, and we will continue to post updates here.
Jackie Wylie, Artistic Director & CEO
Brenna Hobson, Executive Producer & Deputy-CEO