People of African Descent in the United Kingdom

Lord Lilley Excerpts

Monday 17th April 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

My Lords—

[Lord Lilley (Con)]

My Lords—

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

We are talking about racism—

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)]

My Lords, it is, in fact, the turn of the Conservative Benches.

[Lord Lilley (Con)]

Did my noble friend give the visiting body a copy of the excellent Sewell report? It showed that, though discrimination and prejudice exist, are wrong and should be combated, they could not account for most of the disparities. For example, there is a huge disparity between performance of black people from the Caribbean and black people from Africa. Nor could they account for the fact that one of the worst performing groups is white working class people. Did this body comment on those facts?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

No, I do not think it did comment on those facts, yet my noble friend is absolutely right: we had a Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities report written by the esteemed commissioners, and that Sewell report was the basis for our strategy as it stands today. My noble friend brings up a very interesting issue, which is that in all races and faiths there will be some people who need more help than others, and that is exactly what we will be doing in this country.