Call for Liverpool schools to do more to tackle racism

A new race equalities officer will be appointed to work with schools in the city from September

School leaders in Liverpool are "shying away" from the issue of institutional racism in the city's schools, a councillor has said.

Tom Logan criticised "majority white school leadership" and unreliable data regarding racist incidents in a report.

"Every school in this city, to differing extents, has aspects of institutional racism," he said.

A new race equalities officer is to be appointed to work with schools in the city from September.

The issues were raised by Mr Logan, Liverpool City Council's cabinet member for education and skills, in a report to the education and skills select committee, The Local Democracy Reporting Service said.

"This should be an uncontroversial statement, as all of our schools have majority white leadership and always have," Mr Logan said.

"However, we still have school leaders shying away from accepting they have a problem.

"In order to begin addressing this, and the symptomatic issues affecting children and parents, we need to move forward as an education community, supporting schools on a journey to change."

Schools are currently not required to report incidents of racism centrally, which Mr Logan said had made it difficult for the council to "understand the prevalence and tackle the issue" due to "not having reliable data".

However, from September, schools will be asked to report racist incidents to the council and police, although the council will not have the power to determine a school's sanction policy.

The new race equalities officer in education will work with schools to deal with data collection as well as working to increase black teacher representation.

Mr Logan said: "We need to move forward as an education community, supporting schools on a journey to change."

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