Inquiry into ethnic minority female unemployment

NIACE warmly welcomes the All Party Parliamentary Group on Race and Community report on Ethnic Minority Female Unemployment - published today - outlining twenty four recommendations to improve levels of training and employment amongst Black, Pakistani and Bangladeshi women.
Unemployment amongst Black, Pakistani and Bangladeshi women has remained consistently high since the 1980s. Pakistani and Bangladeshi women are particularly affected; 20% of these women are unemployed compared with 7% of white women. The Inquiry reported a number of barriers to employment – discrimination, language issues, cultural attitudes, qualifications and lack of social capital. Childcare was also a problem.
The Group identified English for Speakers of other Languages (ESOL) as a key solution to some of these barriers. Women wanted women-only classes in familiar venues at appropriate times. There are three recommendations on ESOL which NIACE can wholeheartedly support; that ESOL providers are supported to deliver courses more suited to these women’s needs, that pre-courses be introduced in areas of high need and that Government should encourage more work-focused ESOL classes for women who want them. Find out more about the APPG inquiry into ethnic minority female unemployment. Read more...