A West Indian Looks at Race Relations

Extract

There is a great deal of discrimination in Britain against immigrants, and it is essentially discrimination based on colour. Discrimination must not be confused with prejudice. Prejudice is an attitude of mind. Discrimination consists in giving expression to our prejudices by positive action; in this case by excluding one person from some benefit or opportunity, and not taking the same action against another person with the same qualifications.

I have always held that discrimination, from which the native- born coloured suffers as much as any coloured immigrant, was based on colour, and this has been confirmed by the P.E.P. report. In carrying out their survey P.E.P. used an English person, a West Indian, an Indian, a Pakistani, a Hungarian and a Cypriot. If you accept the reaction to the English person as the norm, the findings were quite clear. For example, on one occasion forty places were tested for jobs. The Englishman was offered thirty jobs, the Hungarian twenty-seven, and the West Indian three. This shows the extent to which discrimination is based on colour. It is a fallacy to think that, as most coloured people are newcomers, discrimination will cease, since after a generation or two they will be absorbed. It is much more likely that discrimination will have become greater and segregation will have begun to be confirmed. The P.E.P. report has disclosed that people who have skills which they obtained in this country suffer greater discrimination than others; in fact 70 per cent of the coloured people who have British qualifications suffer from discrimination.