Our commitment to More Than A Moment

In 2020, we were shocked, saddened and angered by the deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, Belly Mujinga and many others, and inspired by the Black Lives Matter movement to examine our work, organisational structures and unconscious bias. To help us realise the essential changes that need to happen, we committed to Culture Central’s More Than A Moment pledge, which is the West Midlands arts sector’s promise to:

Take radical, bold, and immediate action, to dismantle the systems that have for too long kept Black artists and creatives from achieving their potential in the arts and cultural industries. By signing up to the pledge, we promise that as we build our organisation and the wider sector in a world forever changed by a global pandemic, we will do so in a way that can never again perpetuate the systems that stop Black people from thriving within the sector.

To reflect our ongoing commitment to ensuring equity and opportunities for Black artists and creatives, we are publishing our Inclusivity & Relevance Action Plan for 2022/23. This includes specific actions and targets linked to the More Than A Moment pledge, as well as ensuring Black Country Touring continues to reflect the rich cultural diversity of the region.

Actions to date:

Since signing up for the pledge we have:

– Overhauled our recruitment processes and job packs to remove barriers for under-represented arts professionals to work with us, as well as ensuring we share employment and freelance opportunities with specific networks and organisations that support Black artists and creatives;

– Eliminated the use of terms BAME, BME and POC in internal and external comms and continued monitoring of the language we use, to ensure it does not exclude people from our work;

– Regular attendance of More Than A Moment learning sessions, to ensure we are informed of best practices, moving forward with our commitment to a more equitable sector and listening to Black artists and creatives;

– Provided Unconscious Bias training to all staff to ensure we are aware of how the judgements we make unconsciously can affect our decisions and behaviour at work;

– Set specific and measurable targets in our Action Plan to ensure that our programme and projects are reflective of and relevant to the Black communities of the Black Country.