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Equality and Diversity Steering Group
September 16th 2008
Facilities Meeting Room
Salisbury District Hospital

Minutes

Present:
Apologies:
In attendance: / Ruth Blacklock (RB) Chair
Alan Denton (AD)
Sue Whitehead (SW)
Mary Hutcherson (MH)
Maggie Cherry (MC)
Mo Neville (MN)
Sandy Woodbridge (SWo)
Janine Osmond (JO)
Jenny Spicer (JS)
Tracy Nutter (TN)
Andrew Stagg (AS)
Gillian Mayo, DH Pacesetters Programme Manager for the South West
Michail Sanidas, NHS South West Pacesetters Lead
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Action
/
Welcome – RB welcomed Jenny Spicer to the group (staff side representative) and Gillian Mayo and Michail Sanidas from the Pacesetters programme. / RB
1 / Minutes of last meeting
Approved / RB
2 /

Matters arising

Annual equality and diversity report: Approved by Trust Board and published on the website. This contains most of the monitoring data required by the legislation, however disability data (patients) and staff training data still not available, but this is being worked on by education department and IT with SW liaison. Requirement for disability data will be action for new Single Equality Scheme.
Translatable/accessible website: Response received from chair of website review group. Website review is a wide ranging review that will encompass many other things. Awaiting new Chief Exec before decision will be made. Group has registered our requirements. To be included as action in new Single Equality Scheme. / SW
SW
3 /

Pacesetters Wave 2

Gillian Mayo and Michail Sanidas gave a short presentation and explanation of the second wave of pacesetters. Key points included the need for the work undertaken as part of Pacesetters to meet organisational priorities, the need to embed the work in the organisational culture, the need to link in with the PCT and any local health programmes. £30k would be available in the first year to support the work and applications needed to be submitted by September 24th.
The steering group explained about the small diverse populations in South Wiltshire and how it might be hard to cover the areas required by Pacesetters. It was also felt that most of the work programmes were more suited to the PCT and that they probably weren’t in a position to get involved at the moment.
It was agreed that we needed to make a decision whilst all group members were present so RB thanked Gillian and Michail (who left the meeting at this stage) for their time and then chaired a discussion where it was agreed that we would not go forward with Pacesetters wave 2. This was because of the PCT situation and because there was concern for our clinical teams taking on additional work at this time. It was however agreed that we should consider some of the proposed projects on our own, outside of Pacesetters. RB asked SW to formally write to Gillian and Michail to apprise them of this decision. / SW
4 /

Equality Impact Assessments

SW and MN have met to review the policies that currently sit on ICID to identify those that appear to have equality relevance. SW is looking at all other Trust policies. Once the equality impact assessment training is up and running, managers will be contacted to discuss undertaking EIAs for their policies.
SW is continuing to support individual managers in undertaking their EIAs.
EIAs are now being published on the equality and diversity page of the Trust’s website, although policies that sit on ICID can not be published in this way (no link from external website to ICID). This process will need some refining and tidying up in coming months. / SW
SW
5 /

Training

SW has now established contact directly with Marshall ACM and the EIA training is being finalised. It is anticipated that it will be launched at the beginning of October. SW will publicise through cascade brief, Post IT and HNW.
Level 1 training has been updated and workshop based training for level 3 is being developed.
Work is ongoing to try and collect the monitoring data required by the legislation in relation to applicants for training and numbers undertaking training. This is proving to be extremely challenging as the required data sits across two systems (ESR and MLE) and has to be merged. However, It is anticipated that this will be available by the next meeting. / SW
SW
6 / Single Equality Scheme
SW had sent out a first draft of the scheme to the group members and requested that they contacted her with items to be included in the action plan. She explained that she anticipated finalising the consultation draft by the end of the month and then would involve/consult with relevant people during October and finalise the scheme in November ready for the Trust Board in December. She would also be doing the six-monthly update for the same Board meeting.
SW also pointed out that NHS South West’s Single Equality Scheme was out for consultation and she had a hard copy if anyone would like to look at it. / SW
7 / Salisbury Coalition Against Racism (SCAR)
This is a project being run by ‘Salisbury Churches Together’ to highlight that Salisbury will not tolerate racism. Local businesses and organisations are being asked to sign up to the project and the Chief Executive and Chair of the Staff Side have written to the Project team expressing the Trust’s support for the project. It is proposed that an event similar to the ‘Black History Month’ event in Trowbridge is held in the Salisbury Guildhall in the spring, along with a photographic exhibition. SW has suggested that the Trust could have a similar photographic exhibition running concurrently and will discuss with Artcare.
SWo has agreed to act as liaison between the Trust and the project group. / SW
SWo
8 / Staff Diversity Forum (REACH Group)
SWo reported that this group is developing well and that it celebrated its first anniversary in August with a lunch and celebratory cake for all members - which was also attended by members of the steering group. She thanked the steering group for their continued support.
She outlined some of the work that she has been doing as chair of the group and the work that she felt members of the group would benefit from – support with application form/CV writing, interview techniques, equal opportunities training etc.
She identified that some staff were still having difficulty in getting to the meetings and so was going to talk to the DSNs and department mangers about the group and the importance of trying to free up staff to attend. The group suggested that she also publicised REACH through the cascade brief, HNW and Post IT. She reported that she had met with the new junior doctors in August.
On behalf of the steering group RB thanked SWo for her continued work with and in support of the REACH group.
SW mentioned that when drafted, she would like to bring the new single equality scheme to the group for discussion. / SWo
SW
9 / South Wiltshire Diversity Partnership
MC reported that the Gypsy and Traveller group now had PCT representation and that it had been arranged for Maggie Rae, Director of Public Health for Wiltshire to attend the November network meeting and visit the site next to the hospital. / MC
10 / NHS South West Diversity Network
NHS South West launched its diversity network together with their Pacesetters Programme in late June. SW and SWo were in attendance. The next network meeting is on October 21st in Taunton and other members of the steering group are welcome to attend.
The SHA are also holding two ‘compliance workshops’ to look at issues around compliance with the legislation. SW will be attending. / SW
11 / AOB
Freedom of Information Request: The Trust (along with others) has received a large FOI request from EMAP, publishers of HSJ and Nursing Times. SW has responded to all the questions by directing them to the equality and diversity report on the website which contained most of the information they were requesting.
Retirement of Chair: This was RB’s last meeting as Chair as her term of office as a non-executive member finished at the end of October. She thanked the group for their commitment and hard work and for moving the diversity agenda forward in the Trust. MH thanked RB on behalf of the group for her commitment to equality and diversity and wished her well for the future. Stephen Long will be taking over as the non-executive responsible for equality and diversity and SW was meeting with him and RB in October. / RB/SW
12 / Date and Time of the next meeting
Thursday December 4th @ 10am – 11.30am in facilities meeting room
Meeting dates for 2009
Wednesday March 4th 2 – 3.30pm
Thursday June 4th 2 – 3.30pm
Thursday September 10th 10.30 – 12noon
Wednesday December 9th 10.30 – 12noon
All meetings in Facilities meeting Room

H:\My Documents\SHC WORK\Equality & Diversity\Steering Group\Minutes 16.09.08.doc