Debate contribution: Racist Incidents

Debate contribution by Ms Paula Bradshaw on 12 November 2024.

MLA

Ms Paula Bradshaw

Party at the time

Alliance Party

Date

12 November 2024

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Committee Business

Heading

Racist Incidents

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4658348

Read the official Assembly record

Text

At the beginning of August, the Assembly was recalled to condemn the incidents of racism that had occurred over the summer. The motion is not about repeating those words of condemnation, as much as that may be warranted, but about seeking to understand what happened and showing urgency to do something about it. From the evidence that the Committee has heard, it has become clear that racist intimidation had been happening before the summer and has continued since. Racist violence is not simply an isolated, seasonal series of events but endemic in our communities. Unfortunately, PSNI records show that the trend is worsening, not improving. On 18 September, the Committee heard harrowing evidence from stakeholder organisations of racism and Islamophobia. We heard about attacks on their businesses; criminal damage to their places of worship and places of support; violence and intimidation against them; their fear for their children's safety; and their feeling of helplessness because such acts were not stopped by the authorities. The Committee also heard that that is nothing new. Over time, it has been part of a pattern of ongoing racism and xenophobia, damage to property, everyday microaggressions against people who are different and experiences of institutional racism. On 2 October, the Committee heard from the Department and the police about how they had responded to the events of the summer and how they were tackling ongoing issues. Committee members put questions to them based on what we had heard from the stakeholders, including evidence of paramilitary involvement in racist attacks, police officers standing idly by while minority-owned businesses were attacked and police advising victims to engage with community representatives who are known to be involved with paramilitary organisations. It was also noted how ludicrous it was that authorities argued over whose responsibility it was to remove racist posters rather than getting on with removing them. There remain many unanswered questions. What factors led to the circumstances in which so many people assembled to attack our most vulnerable communities? Who were the people carrying out the attacks? Who organised them? Why were the authorities so unprepared? Why was the violence allowed to go on for so long? Why were so many properties allowed to be damaged or destroyed? On 11 September, the Committee considered correspondence from the Commissioner Designate for Victims of Crime. I also met her separately, on 9 October, to discuss her proposal for the Executive Office to carry out a rapid review of the racist incidents in the summer. The Committee agreed to support her call for such a review. That review is necessary because we need to get to grips with the reasons why those things happened and are still happening; understand who was involved and why; find out how prepared the authorities were, how they responded and what impact they had; and make sure that we create the conditions that mean that they will not happen again. The Executive Office needs to carry out the review because of the multidimensional, cross-cutting nature of the issues and potential solutions. Some of the solutions may mean changes in legislation. The Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) recently observed that we need a clearer definition of racial discrimination and a particular statutory offence of hate crime in Northern Ireland. I also met the Committee on the Administration of Justice (CAJ), which raised similar issues. As part of its inquiry into gaps in equality legislation, the Committee for the Executive Office can look at some of the potential changes to the law. However, that goes beyond just adjusting statutory protections for minority ethnic communities. A review can look at the issues in the round. The tragedy is that valued members of our community who contribute to our economy, provide essential services and enrich the cultural diversity of our society have been left to feel that they do not belong. On the contrary, the Committee broadly and consistently restated the view that we are privileged that people from diverse backgrounds have chosen to make this place their home. We can do something about the issue. A concerted, targeted, rapid review of the events of the summer can go some way towards making people who were targets of hostility feel that they belong. The Committee calls for that to happen without delay. I will now make a few brief remarks in my capacity as a South Belfast MLA. It has long been my party's view — in fact, we have stated this publicly on many occasions, including in the week before the racist attacks in early August — that progress on renewing the race relations order and publishing the racial equality strategy and the refugee integration strategy has not proceeded as quickly as it should. Tied to that is the reality that racism and sectarianism are, ultimately, two sides of the same coin. It is being increasingly recognised internationally that they are ultimately the same thing. Where you have an us-and-them, you will always end up with sectarianism and racism. We have to get far more serious about challenging sectarianism, overcoming division, genuinely reconciling and ending paramilitarism. Those are the core principles of our proposal for an additional peace-building mission in and underpinning the Programme for Government. While we should not be prejudicial about what a comprehensive review of the ongoing racist attacks, including those of late July and early August, might determine, we know that the PSNI identified paramilitary influence. The Executive Office has a tendency to put what it does into different silos, but, fundamentally, the evidence is clear: ending paramilitarism, promoting good relations and delivering racial equality are, ultimately, in the same silo. In closing, the motion calls for a rapid review. We are now four months on from the worst weekend of the summer, and we should agree the motion and get on with the work.

974 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

Not flagged

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Assessed 21 October 2026 at 01:20 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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