Equality and diversity report

What we have achieved in 2022-23

Political and Officer Leadership

Commitment to Equality and Diversity

We recognise and value a society that consists of many diverse groups and individuals and considers that this diversity is a strength of the borough. Our Equal Opportunities Policy demonstrates our corporate commitment to equality and diversity.

We are committed to ensuring:

• equality of opportunity in terms of access to our services and that the provision of services reflects, and is appropriate to, the needs of all sections of our community
• prospective and present employees are afforded equal and fair treatment in relation to recruitment, selection, terms and conditions of employment, training and promotion
• individuals from protected groups are encouraged to participate in public life

During 2023-24 we will develop a new Equality, Diversity and Inclusion policy to update and replace our current Equal Opportunities policy.

Priorities and working in partnership

Voluntary and Community Sector

During 2022-23 we have focused on tackling socio-economic inequalities faced by residents through local partnership working with the Voluntary and Community Sector to respond to the ongoing energy crisis and cost of living crisis. We developed information, advice and guidance on our website help with the cost of living to better support residents and signpost them to the available help from both the council and partner organisations across Gateshead and working with Citizens Advice Gateshead we developed 24 advice outlets across the Borough.

In Autumn 2022, to support with rising energy costs we worked with our partners and provided small grants to create a network of Warm Spaces, a group of places where Gateshead people could come together to stay warm and socially active. Our Warm Spaces directory listed all the places available to our residents across the public, private, health and voluntary sectors so that anyone who is cold knows where they can go to get warm, stay warm and have company and some free hot refreshments. We also conducted a number of energy roadshows in high footfall shopping areas and in specific communities of interest to include some 1-2-1 and small group work and we distributed scores of Winter Warmer Boxes which included essential items to "heat the person not the home".

We allocated some of our Household Support Fund (HSF) from government to 'provide crisis support to vulnerable households in most need of support to help with the significantly rising living costs'. We know that those residents facing high levels of socio-economic disadvantage are also more likely to have specific protected characteristics (children in low income families living in poverty and cold homes, people with disabilities claiming benefits and with higher living costs paying a disability premium, and the impact of gender and ethnic minority pay gaps meaning children from single parent or ethnic minority families are much more likely to be living in poverty), so by providing targeted support to these residents we are also working towards improving equality outcomes.

The fund is intended to cover a wide range of low-income households in need including families with children of all ages, pensioners, unpaid carers, care leavers, and people with disabilities. During 2022-23 we supported 7,700 children through extending the Free School Meals provision during school holidays and low-income households though feeding families, Gateshead foodbank and local food co-op support. The Jewish Community Council were funded to support children from low-income households in Jewish schools who do not access free school meals.

Funding criteria required the funding to be distributed 1/3 to pensioners, 1/3 to families with children and 1/3 to other households in need. The following households automatically received an award from the fund: · Households in receipt of Free School meals · Young parents · Families with disabled children and young adults · Care leavers · Households identified by Family support workers or Health Visitors · Families with Children in the Jewish Community where identified need · 8,500 Pension Age residents in receipt of Council Tax Support

Other households in need were targeted through direct referrals and with the help of professionals in social care, early help, councillors and health visitors, pre-school children and young people who did not fall within the free school meal target group. These included: young parents (150), families with disabled children and young adults (228), care leavers (224), Family support worker school referrals (100), Health visitor referrals (100). External partners including Age UK Gateshead, Older People's assembly, Citizens Advice Gateshead referred pension age residents who were just coping in for support.

Regional Equalities Network

We have continued to actively engage with the North East Equalities Network, facilitated by the North East Regional Employers' Organisation. This regional partnership enables shared learning on equality issues across public sector employers. In 2022-23, the focus has been on equality training, procurement of services, meeting the Public Sector Equality Duty and support to staff networks

Employee Equality Network

We continue to support our Employee Equality Network, a council wide staff group, who come together at least quarterly to discuss current EDI issues and inform and influence our approach to equality and diversity through contributing their experience, expertise and ideas. During 2022-23 the network have shaped emerging workforce EDI policies and practice and discussed accessibility to the civic centre for employees and service users.

Performance monitoring and scrutiny

Equality indicators within the Performance Management and Improvement Framework

Our Performance Management and Improvement Framework (PMIF) enables us to know how we are delivering on our Thrive policy and our Health and Wellbeing strategy.  It has a clear focus on priorities, delivery, measurement and analysis of impact.

The analysis of our year-end performance for April 2021 to March 2022 (opens new window) against each of the 6 policy objectives of the Health and Wellbeing Strategy and the Balanced Scorecard is reported to Overview and Scrutiny committees (OSC) and Cabinet. Corporate Resources OSC considered the organisational 'health check' Balanced Scorecard, which includes equality indicators.

Key emerging headlines relevant to equalities include:

• the continuing impacts of rising costs facing local people, families, and businesses, as well as in the delivery of services
• the demand pressures being faced by services such as in children's and adult social care continue to increase, as well as expanding demand for debt advice
• inequalities continue to widen. Thrive data shows a shift (over 2 percentage points) compared with the previous year-end, towards more people being vulnerable, moving from the just coping and managing categories. There is minimal change in the proportion of people 'thriving'
• additional support is still being sought and provided to local people and businesses through various grants, although this is affected additional by burdens relating to central Government's initiatives. Household support grant is to continue for a further 12 months

Our employee equality indicator, percentage of the workforce self reporting their protected characteristics, improved from a baseline of 35% (Mar 21) to our current level of 52% (Mar 23).

For our residents' equality indicators, percentage of residents who are in vulnerable, just coping, managing or thriving categories taken from our Local index of need (LIoN) data analysis, the picture is mixed. Residents identified as being most vulnerable reduced from a baseline of 39.5% to 34.1%. Increases were seen in the percentage of residents just coping or managing, however a reduction noted in percentage of residents who were thriving from 17.7% to 10%.