Racism Is Flourishing in the UK Charity Sector

"At the start, I hate saying this, I think I was just grateful to have a job," says Sahdya Darr.

Darr, a British Pakistani, started working at Quakers – a UK-based Christian charity – in 2017 and for a while let comments citing racist tropes slide. One manager had insinuated to Darr that her partner should be working for “the cause” rather than working in the city because he’s a Black man.

But the turning point came in January 2019, with the arrival of a new manager. Grievance documents seen by VICE World News, including the reports of an external HR consultant, show how an already strained relationship rapidly deteriorated following the terror attack in Christchurch, New Zealand in which a white supremacist killed 51 people at two mosques.

As a Muslim, Darr was deeply saddened by the attack and messaged family and friends to stay safe while attending evening prayers. She was left to formulate the Quakers' messaging on her own and felt distressed and unsupported by her team. She raised this in an email to her manager, who responded that she had been "abrupt" and had spoken to him "with a hostile facial expression and with a raised tone of voice."

Darr felt that these were micro-agressions based on tropes linked to women of colour.

"I don't think I even realised the impact it had on me until I was furloughed [at the start of the pandemic]," Darr says, describing how she would barely get through days at the end. "[But] I think just the constant mistreatment from when he started, that's what led me to raise my first grievance."

When Darr raised a grievance against her manager, he responded with a counter-grievance.

In the counter-grievance, it was claimed that Darr supported “terrorist violence” because she shared an Al Jazeera article about Palestine on Twitter. "No-one realised that was Islamophobic, by accusing me of supporting Hamas, the only Muslim in the team", she says.

On the 12th of February this year, having left the Quakers, Darr tweeted about her experience, starting with, “OK, here goes” under #NotJustNCVO which people were using to post their experiences of racism, bullying and harassment in the charity sector. The movement, ongoing since February, coincides with several internal reports at charities confirming such behaviour often continues unchecked, including allegations of racism at charities that pride themselves on doing anti-racism work.

In February, an independent investigation at children’s charity Barnardo's found “racist and discriminatory behaviour” in the children charity’s fundraising department. In April, an internal report into Amnesty International found a "culture of white privilege," including overt instances of racism and micro-aggressions. And in October, the chief executive of Solace Women’s Aid, Britain’s largest domestic abuse charity, stepped down over allegations of racism.

The #NotJustNCVO hashtag started after National Council for Voluntary Organisations (NCVO) – an umbrella body representing volunteer groups and charities in the UK – published an equity, diversity and inclusion (EDI) report that it had commissioned itself, revealing that "bullying and harassment" according to race, gender, sexual orientation and disability happened "with impunity", leaving members of minoritised groups feeling "unsafe at work" at the organisation. Behaviour included "overt and covert oppression" and "institutional gaslighting" of junior staff if they complained.

This report sparked Sophia Moreau, who has worked in the charity sector for years and says she has experienced racism first hand, into action. She started the #NotJustNCVO hashtag, alongside a group of organisers, now seeking to eliminate bullying, harassment and discrimination in the sector. "The [NCVO] report was transparent and didn't make excuses," she says. "I was tired of it being spoken about in silos. It isn't just one organisation," she says.

Amnesty International UK's director, Kate Allen, responded to the damning report on its "racist" culture saying, "We want to build an anti-racist organisation that applies the principles of equity, diversity and inclusion in all that we do, both in terms of how we operate within Amnesty International UK and our campaigning work." Ex-staffers suggest, however, the organisation did not understand well what anti-racism entailed.

"Amnesty is a very white middle-class environment," says Jonathan Cornejo, who worked at Amnesty International’s UK branch in campaigns between 2014-2019, before leaving because of what he saw as the lack of opportunities for development afforded to POC staff members.

"Any progress you've seen, honestly, on [anti-racism] can be traced back to the often undervalued and very much unpaid labour of people of colour," says Cornejo.

Some have cited a culture of fear in the sector to speak out. "For a very long time, I was very afraid to say anything," said Cornejo, "The fear is in the pushback and the power of the institution... And it's a really scary thing to do when you're alone."

Collette Philip, who runs Brand by Me, a brand and strategy consultancy that helps brands drive social justice and that includes tackling inequity, says that some organisations perhaps recognise very overt racist slurs and symbols but may be less likely to take account of more "insidious, structural forms of racism... micro-aggressions.

"I think that may have blinded them to what was going on in their own house", she says, adding that "people often get caught up in their own sense of purpose and because they're there to do good, they think they can't possibly be racist."

"Even if an organisation has to come out to admit it's racist, at least it can do something about it — that is the only way we're going to drive change."

In some cases, taking a stand on diversity issues has had consequences for people’s careers. In 2018, Mandy Johnson, former CEO of Small Charities Commission, did a photoshoot for a charity trade magazine which was running a story celebrating more women getting into senior leadership of what used to be a “male dominated” sector. However, when she noticed that there were nine white women and no Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) people in the picture, she withdrew her permission to publish the picture with her in it on the front cover of the magazine, withdrawing herself completely from the online version of the piece and publicly apologised for her original involvement.

"I now see that photograph as racist," she tells VICE World News.

Under #NotJustNCVO, Johnson shared a letter from the organisation's then chair in response to the incident, chastising Johnson for taking a stand. “You need to remember that when you speak, you speak for the SCC, and what you need to say doesn’t always coincide with what SCC needs to say,” the letter said.

She was also criticised in an in-person meeting. "At that meeting, I walked out of the office and never went back. I was signed off work with depression," she said, explaining it was the last straw following a strained relationship she had with the chair that impacted her mental wellness.

Once she felt well enough to make the decision she resigned from her role and stayed on sick leave for the rest of her notice period.

The SCC's current chair, Steven Kirkpatrick, said the organisation's recollection of events differed to Johnson's and referred VICE World News to its statement issued following the resurgence of Black Lives Matter protests, stressing the organisation's commitment to diversity. “The welfare of our staff and anyone who engages with SCC, are incredibly important to us and at all times we aim to support them as best we can,” it reads, “We haven’t always got it right, where that has been the case, we have sought to learn, change and improve.”

Now in its tenth month, conversations under #NotJustNCVO are turning to next steps, including prioritising restorative justice like financial support or time off for counselling. There are also calls for rethinking systems around investigations into racism claims and stopping the use of non-disclosure agreements.

The issue of diversity in the sector still needs to be addressed. Figures from 2018 say only 9 percent of the voluntary sector workforce is from a BAME background compared to 13.8 percent of the UK population; a figure that diminishes among more senior roles.

"We're working really hard at Quakers in Britain to become a truly anti-racist employer," said Paul Parker, Recording Clerk for the Quaker Church in Britain, responding to questions from VICE World News, "We can't comment publicly on staff grievances, but I care very much that all our staff feel valued and respected. It saddens me that this has not always been the case. We take this very seriously and it's important that we're accountable when things go wrong. Creating a culture of anti-racism will involve work for us all, and we are still learning how to do it. It is not easy. We may well stumble along the way. But it's what we've got to do."

Darr left the Quakers in September 2020, after she filed a second grievance but stopped engaging with it as she felt anxious. "I don't feel that I received accountability for how I was treated," says Darr.

"It was never just about me. It happened to me. And to me, that shows that that can happen to anybody in that organisation."