National Mentoring Scheme

A national mentoring scheme aims to increase the numbers of Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) women becoming local councillors.

Commissioned by the Government Equalities Office (GEO) and run by Operation Black Vote, the programme will train 60 BAME women in up to 30 local authorities. A further 50 women will take part in a community leadership course to learn more about the role of a local councillor.

The two schemes were initiated by the Women Councillors Taskforce, which produced a report making recommendations aimed at improving the representation of BAME women in local government, who account for less than 1% of all local councillors in England.

To further embed the work of the taskforce, GEO is developing a toolkit, which will be available online, to enable public and third sector organisations to organise BAME gender specific events to raise awareness and encourage more women to get involved in public life.

The taskforce’s other recommendations include:

The collection of more regular and up-to-date data on the diversity of local candidates and elected councillors to identify where efforts should be targeted to bring about a better representation of BAME women councillors;

all political parties to support and encourage BAME women to stand as candidates;

and a national website should be developed as a resource for those interested in becoming involved in local politics.

Click here to learn more..