AFRICAN AND Caribbean people have consistently been at least twice as likely to be unemployed as white people over the past twenty years, new figures reveal.

Trades Union Congress (TUC) analysis of Office for National Statistics quarterly data shows that from 2001 to the present day, unemployment rates for African and Caribbean workers has regularly been three times higher.

Black unemployment has never dropped below twice as high as white unemployment in over 20 years, spanning the governments of Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, David Cameron, Theresa May and Boris Johnson.

Experts say the fact that black unemployment only moves “from bad to really bad” shows the systemic nature of racial injustice as work which is hard-baked into the economy, and changes little whatever party is in power.

The latest figures show that from October to December last year, Black, Asian and minoritised ethnic workers (BME) unemployment was at 7.7% compared to 3.5% for white workers.

However, the picture is even worse for African and Caribbean’s, who are suffering an 8.6% unemployment rate.

Dr Zubaida Haque, Executive Director of the Equality Trust told The Voice that each of the governments over the past 20 years had “wholly missed” tackling the causes of the problem.

She said: “It’s astonishing that it’s not been addressed over two decades given the overwhelming evidence we’ve had, including from the government’s own race disparity unit. 

“It’s about what the consequences of long term unemployment means. It can have a scarring effect which puts people in a vicious circle, where because they haven’t worked they can’t get a foothold in the market.

“This has consequences in terms of child poverty and intergenerational poverty which we know has increased massively in the last couple of years and it is disproportionately among black and ethnic minority children. 

“You’ve got the consequences on intergenerational poverty and on ill health. It’s these kinds of structural inequalities which put BME people at real risk during a pandemic, and during a cost of living crisis such as this.”

TUC analysis shows that black African and Caribbean unemployment topped three times as high as white unemployment in nine quarters from 2002 to 2020.

The rate has never been less than twice as high in the 21 year period, and was the worst under Tony Blair. The premierships of Theresa May and Gordon Brown were the least-worse periods.

However, what the unemployment figures don’t show is the impact of low wages, austerity cutbacks on services, and the ‘casualisation’ of work with black staff being twice as likely to be on a zero hours contract.

The cost of living crisis is predicted to hit black communities hardest, as The Voice warned about it in our front-page story this month.

TUC General Secretary Frances O’Grady said: “BME workers bore the brunt of the economic impact of the pandemic. In every industry where jobs were lost to the impact of Covid, BME workers were more likely to have been made unemployed. 

“Now, BME workers are being held back in their search for work. The pandemic held up a mirror to discrimination in our labour market.  

“As we start to build back, the time for excuses and delays is over. Ministers must challenge the systemic racism and inequality that holds back BME people at work.” 

The BME unemployment gap is now the widest it has been since 2008, and TUC race equality officer Wilf Sullivan pointed out that the post-pandemic employment rate is recovering at a slower rate than that of white workers. 

Figures show black workers are first to get fired in an economic downturn, and last to be rehired when the economy picks up.

The union body is calling for employers to bring in comprehensive ethnic monitoring, to publish their data and work with unions to introduce action plans to address racial disparities in their workplaces. 

Darran McLaughlin, a Bristol-based member of the People’s Momentum coordinating group, said that the problems of systemic racism had not been tackled by any party in government and measures were long overdue.

He called on the government to take advantage of being outside the European Union to introduce positive action measures that would be outlawed by EU directives.

McLaughlin added: “Successive governments have done absolutely nothing to address racial disparities in unemployment. It’s consistent, it’s unchanging. 

“Even if you control for class, and poverty, that, you know, at the minority people are struggling disproportionately in levels of unemployment, like exclusions, lack of opportunity, and education, housing discrimination. So, it’s an ongoing systemic issue.”