Category: blog

Background

This morning (29 July 2024) Anne Palmer tweeted a ‘save the date’ news, announcing that on 13 December 2024 there is to be another Race Equality Networking Dinner; this time in London. So far, there have been two such events in Luton where the movement was started and one in Birmingham.

Having come to England in 1970 as a 12-year-old I have been a participant in postwar multicultural education ever since. Having begun my education at the Steward Street Immigrant Reception Centre (in those days newly arrived immigrants were required to begin our education in such separate centres). After two terms there, for three years I attended a secondary school. Here, on the first day a tall white boy picked me up, banged me against the wall and said: “we don’t want any more fucking Pakis in this school”. After putting me down he took a bow and was cheered by everyone in my 3^rd Year class. Later, I contributed to multicultural education in several roles – as a Youth Worker; school teacher; Education Officer at Wolverhampton Race Equality Council; college lecturer (for 13 years I was Deputy Director of Equal Rights and Management Unit at Bilston Community College); schools adviser for 10 years at Birmingham Advisory Support Services and then for the past 15 years as a consultant in education and equalities. I currently chair the Education Subcommittee of Birmingham Race Impact Group, for whom we have produced an education position paper. BRIG is where REND fits in.

It was a welcome experience to see 300 people gathered in Birmingham on 28 June 2024. My main purpose in attending was not so much the evening itself (though that was important, especially seeing the multiracial gathering) but what results from it that brings about more racial equality in education in the city and beyond.

The following text is based on my own record of the evening in Birmingham, 28 June 2024,  what I heard and took away. I take full responsibility for its accuracy.

White-only jobs (because white people are better than us)

The elephant in the room (in Luton, with a population similarly diverse as Birmingham); the schools did not reflect the ethnicity of the communities that they served. The (minority) children in the schools are encouraged to dream big, to become anything in the whole world as long as it is not wanting to become a headteacher (because that job is reserved for white people). If you looked at the number of black people in school leadership it’s SHOCKING (original emphasis). Another statistic that is shocking is how long minorities last in headship. 

The problem tickles down; representation at the leadership level is poor. Full stop. No one from minoritised backgrounds is saying that we want positive discrimination. 

I never want to be in a leadership position because of the colour of my skin. Nor do I not want to be in a leadership position, because of the colour of my skin. What we have to do is to enable people, to give people the opportunity to flourish to reach the top.

We say to people you are so good that you can be head of maths or head of science. But that is as far as you go. The jobs above are not for you. (They are for white people who are always better than you). 

Recruitment in education as elsewhere happens through networks. You can track a head and also who came with them from their last school. When a deputy gets a headship who moves with them! People take their networks with them. 

Commuter teachers

In a diverse community like Birmingham (Luton is the same) we have people who come together for events. But beyond that they live in silos and in isolation from each other. After the event some will end up in villages and outer areas and some will end up driving home to Alum Rock. Both come together at 9 am and are brilliant in the classroom. Both serve the Birmingham community very well. But they don’t understand each other (because of living in silos). And when two people don’t understand each other the barriers between them continue. 

Network dinners like this are about bringing people together, from ethnic minorities who want to progress and from white communities who can be their allys. Give them the opportunity so both of them can connect, to talk together so that things will change. 

So the most important part of this dinner is networking. Don’t just stay with the people you came with. Meet new people. Connect with someone you don’t know or you may not connect with them were it not for this opportunity. Connect with someone with whom you have nothing in common. Connect with someone that is very different from you. Be brave. Be bold. Just go up to them and start a conversation. 

The world is hostile for minority children

The key thing is that we are here trying to find a way to make a difference. We can never forget who we are and how we got here. I got here because of family, friends and allys. Yes, I am black. But I don’t want my experience to be just another story or helping us to understand the barriers I faced. 

We know the world out there is not a simple meritocracy. Our children have to be taught that yes they will have to work hard, harder than others; also that there is nothing wrong with their brain. They have the capacity to do whatever they choose to do. 

Our children also have to be taught that there are people out there who are opposed to their presence in those spaces. Those people are of the view that you are not supposed to be there. And they will actively seek to trip you up. So, you have to be strong in yourself, understand who you are and take the opportunities that are in front of you and others you have to create for yourself. 

Sometimes we are led to believe that there is not a problem about racial equity. If you look at the very diverse publicity and marketing campaigns you can easily come to the conclusion that job is done. If you watch television at certain times you see global majority people everywhere. In the real world, in our organisations and in our structures, it’s not that easily fixed, like it may be in a marketing or public relations campaign. 

Our children stand in the street and see people like them but the same children, when they are in the classroom, they don’t see people like themselves. Why? We have teachers who are stuck in their jobs and who just can’t get through to the leadership positions. Some reach the middle leader level and then no further. We need to acknowledge that barriers exist. Barriers are there to keep you in your place. We need good mentors who can help us to navigate the next steps and then when we get there we help someone else to travel the same path. 

Our children, our teachers, our CEOs, all of us need such support. Of course there are obstacles. It’s important to be supported how to overcome the obstacles. 

We need to look ahead at the next steps but we also need to look behind, to make sure that the space we vacate is being filled by others. I am talking about the pipeline.  Without the pipeline we will not achieve our diverse organisations. 

(All were asked to stand). There are 300 of us in this space. That is 300 different ways to change our world in education. Just sitting on our bottoms and do nothing is not what is needed. 

Thank you for coming tonight but more importantly for what we are going to make happen as we go forward. 

There is clear racism at play in our schools especially when it comes to Black boys. 

Doors close because of the colour of one’s skin. 

Positive Action

The MERITT scheme was responsible for bringing many of the current cohort of black and Asian educators within Birmingham, thanks to the great Tim Brighouse. Who is going to run a similar programme now?! The task of black and Asian entry into the teaching workforce is as hard as ever. 

A diverse teacher workforce is better at preparing children for a diverse world. 

Birmingham Diocese has put in place its own MERITT programme, with the result already of 4 headteachers and 2 Assistant Headteachers from the global majority. The diocese has also shown leadership in addressing diversity in the boardroom.

In 2024 for schools in Birmingham not to have at least one global majority senior leader is unacceptable. It is unacceptable for MAT boards and local governing boards to not have global majority members in proportion to their community. It is also unacceptable for schools and leaders not to have antiracism training.

The day before Rishi Sunak MP was called a fucking Paki.

Pledge to do something

This (event, gathering) is useful. It is wonderful but it’s not enough. What are YOU (original emphasis) going to do as a result of tonight? What are you going to do afterwards, that promotes race equality in education? It could be a micro action. Think about your values. Think about your voice. Don’t just walk out thinking about the dinner tonight. Think about the future and how you will change it for everyone.

On the tables there were pledge cards for people to record what they were going to do afterwards. 

Today is about the ‘seed and change’, for the coming years. Change is not immediate. The seeds can be planted now. The green shoots will show. Our four recent appointments were from the global majority at senior level. That would have been unthinkable five, six years ago. Let’s make this evening start of a movement for racial equality in Birmingham. 

Despite much good practice in trailblazing schools, the quality and quantity of education for diversity are uneven across England. 

Not all school leaders have bought in fully to the imperative of education for diversity for all schools, and its priority is too low to be effective. 

Some teachers lack confidence in engaging with diversity issues and lack the training opportunities to improve in this area.

Pupils’ voice is not given enough consideration in this area.

Links with the community – a rich resource for education for diversity – are often tenuous or non-existent.

Some indigenous white pupils’ experience of identity issues in the curriculum is that they have negative perceptions of UK/English identities.

Many teachers do not see the link between their subject and education for diversity and are unaware of how to treat it. 

Teachers felt hampered by:

• lack of resources

• not knowing how to source those that do exist

• insufficient training in how to use them properly

There is insufficient knowledge capture and transfer of available resources, pedagogy and general good practice relating to education for diversity. 

The resource of minority ethnic teachers for supporting education for diversity needs to be nurtured. 

Schools do not always recognise the clear link between the promotion of education for diversity and the raising of standards.

There is insufficient effective teacher training – in Initial Teacher Training (ITT), Continuing Professional Development (CPD) or in the National Professional Qualification for Headship (NPQH). 

There must be consistency in the messages coming from the national network of Ofsted, School Improvement Partners, QCA and the awarding bodies, local authorities and the National Strategies, for change and improvement to happen.

All children and young people need to understand their identities and feel a sense of belonging – as important for an indigenous white pupil as a newly arrived immigrant. 

All pupils, regardless of their background, need to be helped to develop a sense of belonging and a cultural understanding and critical literacy skills within their neighbourhoods, however disparate. It makes no sense in our report to focus on minority ethnic pupils without trying to address and understand the issues for white pupils. 

Many indigenous white pupils have negative perceptions of their own identity. 

White pupils in areas where the ethnic composition of their neighbourhood is very mixed, or made up predominantly of different ethnic groups, often suffer labelling and discrimination, giving them a different take on how we live together. They can feel beleaguered and marginalised, finding their own identities under threat as much as minority ethnic children might not have theirs recognised.

If we want community cohesion and for the UK to be at ease with its diversity, as much thought and resource for education for diversity need to be located with the needs of indigenous white pupils as with pupils from minority ethnic groups.

Teachers need to be able, in different contexts, to promote the identities and self-worth of indigenous white pupils, white working class pupils, mixed heritage pupils and minority (and sometimes majority) ethnic pupils, and at the same time to be aware of religion and the multiple identities we all live with. 

Critical literacy is crucial: if you are white, for example, living in a white area, how do you relate what you see on the television to your idea of being British and the nature of British society? If you are black, how do you interpret programmes on AIDs and famine in Africa, or inner city issues in America? If you are Muslim, how do you cope with the barrage of media images about terrorism or the veil? Schools must play their part in recapturing the middle ground for groups who are misrepresented.

The Ajegbo Report can be accessed here.

Many people and political rulers across the globe look at ethnic, religious, and linguistic diversity as a problem or, at least, a shortcoming. In the spirit of a modern age still gripped by the ideals of national sovereignty and homogenous societies, immigrants and minority groups continue to appear as troublemakers – as a threat, that is, to national unity and prosperity.

The book ‘Ethnicity, Religion, and Muslim Education in a Changing World’ edited by Karamat Iqbal and Tahir Abbas encourages us to change that view. It invites us to look at diversity from the perspective of those who are often at the receiving end of cultural ignorance, social and economic exclusion, and violence. Crucially, the book does not present diversity as a problem but as an asset, and it shows practical ways to tackle discrimination and to unlock the potential of a diverse society.

As a historian, I found particularly intriguing the chapter ‘Understanding all our histories’, written by Karamat Iqbal, Jasvir Singh, and Rajwinder Pal. The chapter reveals the glaring gaps in the history curriculum at many schools in the UK, notably concerning the history and experiences of non-white and, more broadly, non-Western people. Yet the authors also cite several inspiring cases where pupils, their parents, and their teachers took it on themselves to change things. In one case, this meant revising the history curriculum to include crucial but hitherto neglected topics such as the partition of India. In another case, students expressed their disdain at the absence or at best one-sided treatment of Black history at their school, prompting teachers to engage in a process of dialogue and review of the curriculum.

As the authors show, these initiatives bring to light controversial and difficult questions: should the purpose of the study of the British Empire at schools be to expose that empire’s violent and racist character? And, if so, how are we to deal with those students, parents, and not a few teachers who emphasise ‘the good things about the Empire’ and claim that we should ‘not make white students feel guilty for something they hadn’t done’ (p. 177)? Should the students learn about the Industrial Revolution in Britain being ‘funded and facilitated’ by the slave trade (p. 179)?

In a university context, where we explore these important issues with our students in depth, I have always found it helpful to begin with a distinction between the evidence and logic-based analysis and multifaceted explanation of events, trends, and processes, on the one hand, and moral or political judgement, on the other. In my view, what we need right now at schools, universities, but also in public debate more generally is more of the former: open-minded study driven by curiosity and respectful dialogue.

Towards the end of the chapter, Rajwinder Pal eloquently underlines the importance of engaging in such a dialogue to create a shared sense of belonging for everyone in the UK. He speaks of the ‘idiocy’ of adopting a view that pits ‘our’ history against ‘“their” history’. That antagonistic approach, he goes on to say, only ‘drives culture wars deliberately seeking to divide us.’ Instead, he argues, ‘colonialism and slavery [are] histories for us all to share and debate in the spirit of enriching and energising us’ (p. 185).

This excellent and important edited volume thus brings up difficult and unresolved questions that we all need to address together. The challenge of history is to bring the past in a dialogue with the present. For our own time, as this collection of essays so well highlights, finding empathic, inclusive, and productive approaches to diversity is at the centre of that challenge.

Dr Volker Prott, Biography

Volker Prott is senior lecturer in modern history at Aston University. His main field of research is twentieth century international history. His work focuses on nationalism and borders, ethnic violence, humanitarian politics, international organisations, and foreign intervention. His first book, ‘The Politics of Self-determination: Remaking Territories and National Identities in Europe, 1917–1923’, was published with Oxford University Press in 2016. Currently, he is working on a project entitled ‘Breaching Sovereignty: Foreign Interventions in the Cold War’, focussing on the Congo Crisis in the early 1960s and the Indo-Pakistani conflict in 1947–1953 and again in 1971.

On my iPad I was organising my Pahari articles. There seemed to be an obvious omission; that of Dr Farah Nazir. I knew she had written several articles, as I knew her work through the British Kashmiri Academics WhatsApp group which I had established. So, I searched her name on the internet. Up came a long list of entries, including the article I had instigated. I saved the links for reading later. One particular entry stood out as a bit of an emotional Pahari connection moment. The item came up with the name Awais Hussain (he of the Mirpur Heritage page on Facebook, member of the above WhatsApp group). I then noticed the picture. It looked very familiar, not surprisingly because it was a photograph, of the snowcapped Himalayas, I had taken during one of my visits to my birthplace, taken in Ratta where I had gone to Middle School. My first thought: how did she end up with that? 

I carried on reading the post. Of course, it was the poem Hill Speak by Zafar Kuniyal, he being the son of the man from Mirpur. It went….

There is no dictionary for my father’s language.
His dialect, for a start, is difficult to name.
Even this taxi driver, who talks it, lacks the knowledge.
Some say it’s Pahari – ‘hill speak’ –
others, Potwari, or Pahari-Potwari –
too earthy and scriptless to find a home in books.
This mountain speech is a low language. Ours. “No good.
You should learn speak Urdu.” I’m getting the runaround.

Whatever it is, this talk, going back, did once have a script:
Landa, in the reign of the Buddhists.
… So was Dad’s speech some kind of Dogri?
Is it Kashmiri? Mirpuri? The differences are lost on me.
I’m told it’s part way towards Punjabi,
but what that tongue would call tuvarda,
Dad would agree was tusaana –
‘yours’ –

truly, though there are many dictionaries for the tongue I speak,
it’s the close-by things I’m lost to say;
things as pulsed and present as the back of this hand,
never mind stumbling towards some higher plane.
And, either way, even at the rare moment I get towards –
or, thank God, even getting to –
my point, I can’t put into words
where I’ve arrived.

Then I got to the bottom of the post and there it was, the acknowledgment:

Photo credit: Dr Karamat Iqbal, taken in 1986 in tehsil Dadyal. I then remembered something about sharing with Farah the photo; memory and old age!

I remember 17 December 1971 very well. I had been in England just over one year and two months during which time I had learnt a little about East Pakistan. It was part of Pakistan that I had not heard of until I came to England as a 12 year old. But then I didn’t know much about anything, being the age I was and having grown up in a rural community in Kashmir which had no contact with the outside world. We had not much access to radio or newspapers and no television (there was no electricity). And now East Pakistan had become Bangladesh.

Upon arrival in Birmingham I began to read Urdu newspapers. There was much coverage about East Pakistan. There was also much talk about Pakistan where an election was taking place, first such election in the history of the nation. 

Following the election I remember learning about the war in East Pakistan. This I believed was because the East Pakistanis wanted to become separate from Pakistan. I thought they were terrible people (for this was how they were portrayed in the Pakistani press). 

I also learnt there was some sort of disaster which had led to many people dying. This had led to a concert being organised in the West. I saw the film – A Concert for Bangladesh – at the cinema in Quinton, Birmingham. This was the concert where people had applauded Ravi Shankar, when he was tuning his sitar. 

Since then I have been trying to educate myself about what was East Pakistan, the birth of Bangladesh and the reasons for it. It took little time and learning effort to come to the conclusion that there was much reason for the new country to be born. I even wondered what took them so long. 

By 1979 I had a very different view of the Bangladesh situation and those who had come from there and were now living in Birmingham. It was this year that I established the Asian Studies, a course which enabled white public sector professionals to learn about the Asian communities they served. I made sure the Bangladeshi community was included alongside Pakistanis and Indians. 

Late, after deciding to become a baptised Christian, one of the first volunteering roles I had was to chair the Management Committee of St James Advice Centre which served the Bangladeshi community and which was staffed by the Bangladeshi Zia ul-Islam. A few years later I led the Birmingham Asian Role Models project. The 20 people I included in proportion to their presence in Birmingham had Tozammel Huq. Also, I took any opportunity to develop friendships with Bangladeshis wherever I could. 

My learning journey about Bangladesh has continued. Many years ago I picked up a copy of the book The Last Days of United Pakistan by GW Choudhury (1974). The author had been a member of the Pakistan Cabinet in 1969 so was able to see the situation first hand as it developed into the final breakup of Pakistan. He was of the view that there were similarities between the Muslim nationalism of undivided India and Bengali sub-nationalism within united Pakistan. He quoted an East Pakistani political leader:

What was the original demand of the Muslim League in India before independence? Fair shares – in appointments, in jobs, in political influence. It was only the blindness and selfishness of the Hindus that translated that into the demand for partition and now the West wing [West Pakistan] is taking the same attitude to us.

Elsewhere the author goes onto sum up the fundamental problem that led to the break up of Pakistan:

In a democracy, the majority should not have to ask for safeguards, such as regional autonomy, reservation of places in the civil service and the Army, and guarantees that the economic development of their region would not be neglected nor their culture threatened.

And yet, throughout its existence it is exactly these guarantees that the majority Bengali group had to seek. “When they were not granted Bengali sub-nationalism gathered momentum until ultimately it became a national movement for the creation of a separate state”.

My most recent reading matter about the Bangladeshi community has included the works of Aftab Rahman and Mashkura Begum. Since then I have read two more books (and a few other bits of information); the first of these was ‘Tony – the life of Tozammel Huq MBE’. ‘The making of Bangladesh as I saw it’ is the second book I read, by Muhammed Idrish. The author provides a first-hand perspective on his birthplace.

I learnt from these books that the seeds for Bangladesh were sown at least as long ago as 1948. According to Huq, “In February 1948 an announcement was made that Urdu was to become the official language of Pakistan”. The decision was embedded in 1952 when the Prime Minister Khawaja Nazimuddin declared that “Urdu would be established as the sole official language of Pakistan. He went onto suggest that regional languages, if written at all, should use the Persian script to maintain compatibility with Urdu and emphasise the Islamic spirit of Pakistan”. The Bengali script is not Persian-based but derived from Brahmi.

We learn from Huq that politically conscious people across East Pakistan listened to this decree with horror and outrage: “the suggestion that Bengali should be reduced to a regional patios written in an alien script was just too much for any true Bengali to bear”. They planned a demonstration to be held on 21 February 1952.

Language martyrs, the birth of the International Mother Language Day

While all public protests were banned the Dhaka demonstration on 21 February went ahead. There was a stand-off between the demonstrators and the large number of police. Shots were fired which led to the killing of several of the student protestors. This tragic incident was a major turning point in the birth of Bangladesh. From that day onwards it was not a matter of if but when the citizens would achieve independence from their current oppressors. Four years later Bengali did get recognition as the official language of East Pakistan.

Idrish tells us:

On 21 February 1952, police opened fire with live ammunition on unarmed student protestors outside Dhaka university, killing five students. it outraged the whole of the Bengali population of the country.

Huq was 12 years of age at the time of the language demonstration. It was to prove formative for him and he would go onto play a key role in response. 21 February became established as the Language Martyrs Day.

In 1988 Huq was appointed Ambassador of Bangladesh to France and concurrently as Ambassador to Spain and Ambassador and Permanent Delegate to UNESCO. Federico Mayor, Director General of UNESCO 1987-1999, in his Introduction to Huq’s book says the following:

Tony played a crucial and significant role with regard to UNESCO’s proclamation of 21 February as an international Mother Language Day. The proposal was sent to UNESCO at its headquarters in Paris in late summer 1999 by the Government of Bangladesh…. Tony had already talked to me about it and briefed me about the history and significance of 21st February 1952. He requested my support to which I agreed.    

UNESCO wanted to delay the adoption of 21 February but “on the strength of Tony’s argument” “relented” and “agreed to revive the proposal” and “unanimously passed the resolution in November 1999 “.

Language was not the only issue. It was obvious that all of the development efforts of the government were centred on West Pakistan even though the East wing contained more than half of the country’s total population.

New capital? West Pakistan. Major infrastructure projects? West Pakistan. Industrial development? West Pakistan. Head offices of the banks and financial houses? West Pakistan. If a new era was dawning it was certainly not promising much for East Pakistan.

Huq was active in student politics. This led him to attend a conference in Canada where he made a speech which was seen as sharply critical of the Pakistan government, headed by Ayub Khan. He was advised to not return home for fear of arrest. This he did by enrolling as a PhD student. However, after eighteen months he was persuaded to move to London, in 1963, where he enrolled at the Inner Temple, to study for the Bar.

Circumstances led for Huq to end up in Birmingham where he began working as a teacher in Balsall Heath, eventually to be the Headteacher at Ladypool School, in the late 1970s. This was when I first encountered him; I was a youth and community worker and had organised the Asian Studies. We learn that Huq married his wife Sheila, a school colleague, in Solihull on 26 October 1968.

Back in East Pakistan in November 1970 a cyclone had hit the area, causing almost half a million deaths and a million more became homeless. We learn from Idrish:

The Pakistan government was very slow in organising rescue and relief operations. For the first three days they even denied that anything serious had happened.

We heard that more than 200 relief planes landed in Dhaka airport from many countries of the world; only one of them was from West Pakistan.

I saw unburied dead bodies scattered around, some floating on the water. We had to divide ourselves into two groups: one group to orgnaise food for the living and the other to bury the dead. The bodies floating on the water were rotten and yellow in colour. The corpses washed ashore were so rotten and decomposed that we had to douse them with paraffin and burn them.

This neglect by the government was to inflame the independence movement.

Soon after an election was held which led to more than half of the seats being won by the Awami League, led by Sheikh Mujib, a colleague of Huq. According to Idrish:

The Awami League (led by Mujib) won 151 seats. This gave them an outright majority in a 300 seat Assembly.

Yahya Khan (the president of Pakistan) came to Dhaka soon afterwards, met Sheikh Mujib and told reporters that Sheikh Mujib would be the next Prime Minister. 

In West Pakistan the People’s Party led by Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto won 81 seats.

Bhutto demanded power sharing. Sheikh Mujib refused.

In Birmingham and elsewhere in the UK, Huq played his full part in the Bangladesh struggle for independence.

Every weekday morning at 7 am he would be standing at the gate of one of the factories, Wilmot Breedon or BSA, talking to East Pakistani workers as they emerged from the night shift and collecting the small sums they were able to afford, five shillings here, ten shillings there. At 8.30 am he would report for duty at the school. then, after a full day of teaching, he would return to the factory gates to catch the workers as they poured out at the end of the day shift.

Idrish played a frontline role in the struggle for the new nation. He and his friends were a part of the home-made guerrilla movement:

A few rifles for our training were supplied by the police department. There was no ammunition; there was no shooting practice. Most of us carried replica wooden rifles, made by ourselves and painted black to give them an authentic look.

We learnt about various tactics in guerilla warfare. We were taught how to crawl on our knees and elbows holding a rifle parallel to the ground. … In the absence of the real thing we used dried mud balls as grenades.

We started imagining ourselves as Viet Cong guerillas fighting the Americans. We imagined ourselves in the army of Che Guevara and Fidel Castro. We were the heroes in our own imagination.

  How the birth of Bangladesh was announced in these words:

‘At 16.31 hours Indian standard time, General Amir Abdullah Khan Niazi, commander of the Pakistan Eastern Command, surrendered to General Jagjit Singh Aurora, the general officer commanding of the Indian Eastern command at Ramna Race Course in Dacca. All fighting has ceased. Dacca (Dhaka) is now the free capital of a free country. We hail the people of Bangladesh in their hour of triumph. All nations who value the human spirit will recognise it as a significant milestone in man’s quest for liberty…….’.

Idrish tells us that a new country was born.

We were free. The hundred or so people who gathered round the radio burst into impromptu chants. People were chanting:

‘Victory to Bengal, victory to the freedom fighters.’

‘Joy Bangla, Joy Mukti Bahini.’ 

‘My country is Bangladesh, your country is Bangladesh.’

‘Amar Desh,Tomar Desh, Bangladesh, Bangladesh.’ 

People hugged each other and marched through the country paths in darkness. There was an outpouring of emotion and people were crying tears of joy. All-India radio played:-

‘A million salutes to you, whose name is Bangladesh’

‘Lakho se Salaam, Bangladesh Zisco Nam.’ “

Idrish tells the story in these words:

….. When I reached the Nazneen Cabinet firm, I saw a group of young boys sitting in front of the shop commonly known as the Inspector’s shop, which belonged to retired food inspector Muhammad Abdul Bari. They were holding rifles in their hands but their heads were lowered. They were in a very dishevelled state.

I recognised one of them, a student of Rajendra College. They were Freedom Fighters and they had just entered the town. They were part of the Mukti Bahini unit which fought battles the week before with the Pakistani army at Karimpur Bridge, on the Jessore road, where some of their comrades had fallen. One of the fallen comrades was Meshbauddin Noufel, son of the shop’s owner. They had come to see Noufel’s parents who lived in their house behind the shop. I knew Noufel, a student of Rajendra College, a polite and intelligent boy. I felt sad.

I stood there for a while to pay my respects to them. I had a chat with them. Tears came to my eyes when one of them said, ‘Today everybody is happy but we are sad.’ I could say nothing in reply; there was no reply.

Uncomfortable questions

An indication of my interest in Bangladesh is the various material that I have gathered over the years. In a democracy it is the norm that the political party that wins the most seats forms the government. This had not happened when it came to the Awami League led by Sheikh Mujib who had won 160 of the 300 seats for the National Assembly. 81 of the seats were won by the Pakistan People’s Party (led by Bhutto in West Pakistan).

In his article – who broke up Pakistan? The Nation from London 19-25 May 2007 – Aqeel Daanish spoke of the phrase “idhar hum udhar tum” (us here, you there), which was referenced to Bhutto who had won most seats in West Pakistan and Mujib had won the most seats in East Pakistan. So, Bhutto was effectively saying two majority parties would rule in the different wings of Pakistan, in other words a break up of the country. The writer also points out that right from day one East Pakistan was treated as alien and its population (majority of the nation) were ruled by the Western wing (the minority).

For Syed Munawar Hasan (The Nation 17.12.2005)

“dismemberment of Pakistan is to date the worst disaster of our national history. Its route cause was the sense of deprivation among Bengalis caused by dictatorial policies of the rulers from Pakistan. However, the refusal to accept the results of 1970 elections proved to be the last nail in the coffin”.

He also confirmed the ‘idhar hum, udhar tum’ intention of Bhutto.

Ahmad Faruqi (The Nation 11-17 December 2009) wrote an article on the dismemberment of Pakistan and creation of Bangladesh; the title says it all: ‘The darkest December’. The longstanding cause of this for him went back to the early days after Pakistan had come into existence.

Since the two wings did not share a common language, it made no sense to impose a single language on them. Imposing Urdu, a minority language spoken in the west, made even less sense. But that was precisely what was done in 1952. Deadly language riots ensued in the east.

He goes onto point out that in the years that followed the Bengalis felt like they had traded one colonial master for another. This was the same point Choudhury had made:

The Bengalis found a new ruling group set over them in place of the former British officials.

It is pleasing to see that some in the Pakistani civic society have continued to ask questions about the separation of East and West Pakistan. Recently, it was asked: why was Sheikh Mujib not invited to form the government when he had won the most number of seat? This was by the journalist Tanveer Zaman Khan. The answer is obvious: Because he was from East Pakistan. It was inconceivable for the West Pakistani dominated government including and especially for the largest political party Pakistan People’s Party led by Zualfiqar Ali Bhutto. According to Tanveer Zaman Khan, for the previous three decades the Western wing had exploited East Pakistan’s resources- rice, tea and patsun (white jute). Any resources in the western wing were treated as belonging to the provinces but the resources of the eastern wing were seen as belonging to the Centre (meaning the West). Choudhury confirmed this:

East Pakistan earned most of the country’s foreign exchange by the export of jute; yet most of the foreign exchange was spent on the industrialization of West Pakistan.

Idrish provides an example of Bengali exclusion. He mentioned that in 1971 he was watching a cricket match between an international team and the Pakistan national team (who for the first and only time had included one single Bengali player).

I end this review note with two quotes, from Idrish. The first of Joan Baez singing the song of Bangladesh:

When the sun sinks in the west

Die a million people of Bangladesh

The American poet and activist Allen Ginsberg visited the refugee camps in Kolkata and wrote his famous poem September on Jessore Road:

Millions of fathers in rain

Millions of mothers in pain

Millions of brothers in woe

Millions of sisters nowhere to go

Happy belated 52^nd birthday anniversary to the nation of Bangladesh. May its people, home and abroad, forever go on prospering.

Tim (as everyone called him; it would have been inappropriate to call him Mr Brighouse) left Birmingham around the time I joined the Council as a Schools Advisor. So, what little I know of him I learnt afterwards, including now. During my PhD research I learnt about his extensive work on race and education and which is included in my 2019 book – British Pakistani boys, education and the role of religion- in the land of the Trojan Horse’.

It is necessary to provide a bit of background to what Tim inherited in Birmingham education in terms of multicultural education.

The city’s education department was one of the early responders to needs of immigrant children as recorded in Rose et al: Colour and Citizenship (1969). The authority was also the first to acknowledge the plural nature of society by issuing guidance on the teaching of world religions (Does it do as it says? Learning for living. 15:4 125-126). Later, by the 1980s, in place was the Multicultural Support Service which was where my teaching career had begun in 1983. Building on this, the incoming Labour administration, in the 1984, had made clear its commitment to a multicultural and anti-racist education:

Curriculum must reflect the diversity of cultures in our society and must positively counter racism 

Multi-cultural curriculum must apply to all subjects, all age groups and all schools and colleges

In-service training for teachers with particular emphasis on training in racism awareness

Greater recruitment of ethnic minority teachers.

The Multicultural Support Service contained within it a number of units. One of these was the Multicultural Development Unit which had 34 experienced teachers who were strategically placed in primary and secondary schools. Apart from teaching, their job was to assist in the whole process of moving towards an education that better meets the needs of all pupils in a multicultural city. Another was the Afro-Caribbean Teaching Unit, made up of 7 experienced teachers. There were also the Community Languages Unit and an English as a second language unit which I had joined upon training as a teacher. The above service produced the Multicultural Review. Each issue carried articles including some written by practising Birmingham teachers. Edited by David Ruddell, the journal was circulated to all schools, free of charge. 

At the time, Birmingham City Council had in place a 20% target for recruitment of ethnic minority employees. In 1993, the year Tim arrived, the Education Department had reported achieving well in excess of the target, at 33%; 29% in 1992.

There is a story about Tim’s arrival in Birmingham and his absence from his office for a week or more. He was out and about visiting schools across the local authority. This personal approach was to mark his ten years in the city; he was clearly not an office-based  bureaucrat.

He says thank you, when it’s merited, whether he sees something worthwhile himself or it is reported to him by his advisers. He has sent out 5,000, maybe even as many as 10,000 thank you notes in the last nine years. He won’t have talk about his leadership being all inspiration. “It’s 1% inspiration and 99% hard work and attention to detail and trying to get systems right,” he says.

Sir Tim Brighouse was an extraordinary man who embraced so many paradoxes, perhaps that is why he was so extraordinary. He was understated and humble, yet had significant influence at the top levels as well as local ones. He was all about school improvement at a system level and yet always remained the champion of teachers and students, never losing his connection with, or love of, the classroom. He was incredibly intelligent and insightful and yet never used that over people nor ever used it to make others feel inferior, he had a way of elevating others.

He advocated for a similar approach in others. In his book ‘How Successful Headteachers Survive and Thrive’ Tim suggested that Heads should greet children and teachers as they enter school. They should go on a daily walk, talking to kitchen staff and cleaners as well as teachers, and sometimes follow a pupil through a day’s lessons. They should say “we”, not “I”. And they should spend two hours a week doing “acts of unexpected kindness”rememberingbirthdays and writing appreciative notes.

In another of his books ‘Essential pieces – the jigsaw of a successful school’, Tim advocated leading and managing at different levels, ensuring that everyone plays their part. In addition, he made a case for creating a fit environment – visually, aurally, behaviourally and in a way that encourages learning – and involving and connecting with parents and the community. 

During his nine-year tenure, the authority was at the forefront of developments in antiracist multicultural education. In 2003, Warren and Gillborn, who had been commissioned by Birmingham City Council and Birmingham Race Action Partnership, in their report Race Equality and Education in Birmingham stated how well the city was doing and reminded us that others often followed its example: 

Birmingham Local Authority has established an enviable reputation as an urban authority that takes seriously both an overall agenda to ‘raise standards’ and a commitment to greater equity and social inclusion.

Birmingham has been identified nationally as a leading authority in the field of race equality: consequently our findings have significance beyond the city itself.  

The Local Authority was well known for the publication of resources on race and education. One such document was Together we can stop bullying – guidance for schools and other education services on challenging bullying and racial harassment. I particularly recall that document because I was asked to help revise the Section 5: Guidelines for reporting, recording and monitoring racial incidents, in the light of the Macpherson Report. Another resource was We also Served – testimonies of the contribution made in two World Wars by the peoples of the Indian Sub-Continent, Africa and the Caribbean.

Later, in an interview with Gillborn et al, Tim recalled his work as Chief Education Officer in Birmingham, emphasising that by the early 1990s the local authority had access to detailed data on performance by ethnicity and gender:  

The period where I went to Birmingham – so that’s ’93 – by that time, in Birmingham …we had rich data about how well different groups were performing. Now nationally we hadn’t and I distinctly remember when I was in Birmingham saying, ‘Hey, come on, I’ve got a problem with African Caribbean boys’ – and girls – but particularly boys and particularly poor boys …Incidentally when I [went] to a school and ask[ed], ‘How are African-Caribbean boys doing in your school’ – and I knew the answer – the leadership of the school were surprised that I was asking the question and [they] clearly hadn’t thought about it. …So I think that the driver to get interested in all the issues from about that period on was because by the time I left Birmingham, then all that data was available.

Tim explained to the researchers that the data had given the local authority the leverage to open up questions about racial inequality that many individual schools had not yet begun to acknowledge. This provided the basis for the establishment of groups; one for African Caribbean achievement and another one for Pakistani and Bangladeshi pupils. The groups were responsible for monitoring the experience and attainment of the target group of pupils and for recommending improvements and initiatives designed to raise achievement. These groups were radical in many ways, especially so because they provided a platform for Black and Asian community activists to bring their ideas to headteachers and local authority policymakers as well as holding the bureaucrats to account. 

There were numerous initiatives that resulted from this approach and these achievement groups, including work with Black and Asian parents, mentoring schemes targeted at ethnic minority students who were underachieving and regular reports being published which provided the city much useful data. Above all else, in a city where the phrase ‘dictatorship of the bureaucrats’ had been coined (Newton in his book Second City Politics) it was during Tim’s time that such culture of accountability in education became a norm, including and especially for ethnic minorities who were previously kept at a distance from education centres of power and decision-making.  

Probably the best document that summarises the race equality work in Birmingham Education during that period was the submission to the Stephen Lawrence Inquiry Public Policy Review Panel Birmingham:

• The Chief Education Officer has measurable specific ‘targets’ for improvement for underachieving groups
• The Education Service is integrating the Macpherson recommendations into its ongoing programme to enhance minority ethnic achievement, promote cultural diversity and combat racism.
• Grant-aiding of 111 community supplementary schools so to recognise the significance of minority cultures and languages and their relationship with educational achievement
• Minority Ethnic Recruitment to Initial Teacher Training scheme which had enabled 66 people to gain qualified teaching status, with a further 20 in the process.

Tim had led by example in this respect and pretty much everything he asked others to do. An illustration of this was when Tim attended, as the Chief Education Officer, a meeting with the African Caribbean community. He referred to it as a ‘baptism of fire’:

The hall was full of 300 or so people from the African-Caribbean community. All were angry. All felt let down by the education system. Most were in despair. It was difficult not to be defensive and almost impossible to persuade them that I would or could contribute anything.

Birmingham also had a number of innovations which were aimed at all children but which had a particular benefit for children from disadvantaged backgrounds. One example of this was the ‘guarantees’. The primary school guarantee promised improvements in school budgets. It promised that the local authority would try to improve its services to schools and to listen to expertise in school improvements. It promised to follow through on targets for literacy and numeracy. Also, every child was to have the opportunity to take part in a public performance and go on a residential field trip; every child was to have whatever they were good at in the expressive arts identified; every child would be part of a group producing a book or multimedia project that would tell a story for a younger age group; all would take part in a collective environmental inquiry. Meanwhile, the Secondary Guarantee promised that:

Throughout their total 11-16 school life pupils should have been encouraged to celebrate the City’s wide range of cultures and religions, and have been taught to promote racial and sexual harmony, tolerance and injustice (sic; of course they meant justice).

The authority was inspected by Ofsted in 2002 the report from which stated:

Birmingham local education authority is one of a very small number of EAs which stand as an example to all authorities of what can be done, even in the most demanding urban environments.

The LEA’s work to combat racism is described as very good with a number of different initiatives to raise achievement of minority ethnic groups also highlighted.

Soon after receiving a glowing endorsement from Ofsted Tim decided to leave Birmingham. There was much that was different now compared with the situation in 1993 when he had first arrived.

Since Mr Brighouse’s appointment in 1993 results in the city have improved year on year at all levels and at a faster rate than national averages. In Birmingham in 2001 41.4% of pupils achieved 5 or more A to C grades at GCSE compared to 33% in 1996. At key stage 2 in 2001 71% achieved level 4 or above in English compared to 46% in 1996, 67% in maths compared to 44% and 85% in science compared to 48%.

‘Tim’s contribution to Birmingham is almost immeasurable. He took an under performing service and made it a service with an international reputation for urban education. He leaves the department in amazingly good shape with a superb collection of head teachers, advisors and support staff. We are committed to continuing improvement and will not be complacent.’

I had little chance for contact with Tim, especially in person. One time he came to one of our staff gatherings. My highlight from that event were the few minutes I spent with him in the dinner queue. I said to him: I sometimes wonder whether I should work full time as a schools advisor. He said it wasn’t about being full time in one job or part time in a couple; it was the total impact you made that mattered. Suffice it to say I carried on portfolio working until I was made redundant when Birmingham dismantled its education advisory services.

We could see the progress that had been made in race equality during Tim’s time by looking at another comment from Ofsted the year after Tim left; – thematic inspection on combatting racism:

We found the schools we visited to be very outward-facing institutions – acting to mainstream race equality and ask how they could provide better education opportunities for children (and parents).

We were impressed by the schools’ engagement activities with parents. That work enabled support on attainment (such as mentoring) and progress to be effectively communicated; offered parents access to extra-curricular activities; and built parental confidence in the positive nature of school/pupil relationships.  

In 1996, Tim had written the following words (at the end of his chapter: Urban Deserts or Fine Cities? in the 1996 book by Barber and Dann: Raising Educational Standards in the Inner Cities) which give us a clue how things were done back then:

Birmingham is fortunate: there is one common factor of agreement and determination. We are going to capitalize on our teachers and the hopes of all our parents for the next generation. Together we are applying the lessons of research and we are backed by formidable political will.

Champion of Muslim children

In one of his interviews Tim talked of the need to understand race as a permanent social issue (‘I don’t believe racism will ever be cracked at all. I don’t …it’s something you’ve just got to keep returning to’). He was particularly critical, therefore, of what he perceived as the government’s failure to address issues such as Islamophobia and a general failure to maintain a focus on equalities in education. 

During his time, Birmingham Education had produced a number of resources that had their focus on Muslim children, the largest pupil religious group in the city’s schools:

• Understanding your Muslim pupils – for new teachers to Birmingham
• Muslim music and culture in the curriculum
• Improving participation of Muslim girls in physical education and school sport

Birmingham had been one of the first local authorities to publish guidance for education of Muslim children: Revised guidelines on meeting the religious and cultural needs of Muslim pupils, published jointly by the City of Birmingham Education Department and the local Muslim Liaison Committee. The working group that produced the guidelines was established in 1984. The resulting document, while focused on Muslim children, was seen to have wider implications.

It should be seen as an instrument that guides our provision and response to the needs of other religious minorities, since the principles of tolerance, respect, and recognition of cultural and religious groups are universally applicable.

The wider context for the guidelines was the local authority’s document: Education for our multicultural society: equality assurance—the authority’s policy. The aim of this policy was to promote equality and justice through the establishment of a multi-cultural and anti-racist perspective in the city’s schools, as follows:

• preparing all pupils for a life in a multi-cultural society and building upon the strengths of cultural diversity.
• providing for the particular needs of children having regard to their ethnic, cultural, and historical background
• being aware of, and countering, racism and the discriminatory practises that give rise to it.

Tim, in his role as the Chief Education Officer, endorsed the guidelines in these words:

I am delighted to know that the Muslim Liaison Committee has produced these guidelines. I would recommend schools consider the guidelines for meeting the needs of their Muslim pupils and make good use of them.

The guidelines focused on a number of areas, including collective worship, prayer facilities, religious festivals, school meals, sex education, dress and uniforms, showering and changing, swimming, and a range of other curriculum areas such as music, dance, and drama. Tim was to repeat his commitment to the education of Muslim children in British society. In his role as the then Chief Advisor for London Schools and Visiting Professor at the Institute of Education, he was the guest of honour at the launch of national guidance for Muslim education by the Muslim Council for Britain (further details in the blog written at my encouragement). This stated:

It is essential that positive account be taken of the faith dimension of Muslim pupils in education and schooling. The faith of Muslim pupils should be seen as an asset to constructively addressing many of the issues that young people face today.

Tim said:

I think it is a hugely important day, not merely for the Muslim community in this country but for our society as a whole, that you have done this. I think it is a superb document, and I thank you for it. I think it is a splendid first draft, and even if you never got to a second draft, it would still be a terrific document that we have.

Every school in this country needs to have this, and I appeal to the teachers’ unions in this country to give their full backing to this document; they would ensure that the teachers have a better opportunity of unlocking the minds of everybody in this country if they took it seriously.

I could tell you that 500 schools in Birmingham would welcome this document, and that’s in Birmingham alone. And I can tell you that another 3,000 schools in London would welcome this document. I read it cover to cover. I think it’s a fantastic document.

We need documents such as this from all faith positions, and I hope people from different faiths will read this document and make sure that the schooling system has references to this point. i.e., that they can use in their schools.

Tim mentioned the Chartered London Teachers Conference to be held the following week, which he was going to chair. With reference to the conference delegates, he went on to say that the document was…

…based on the premise and assumption that to teach in an urban area, particularly London, which has many faiths, many religions, and many races, there is a requirement on all teachers to have greater knowledge, greater skill, and greater expertise to do the basic job of a teacher, which is to unlock the mind and open the heart of our children in our schooling.

Next week, I am going to draw this document to the attention of the conference, and I am going to ask them to campaign with me to make sure that documents like this are prepared from different religious points of view. So, they have the best chance of unlocking the minds of all our future citizens.

Speaking about the choice and determination of this society and this country, Tim said,

The choices are: are we really determined? We are going to a place that is proud to be a society where people of many different faiths, coming from many different races, and speaking many different languages live together in harmony, peace, and respect for each other. I think it is a contribution precisely to that determination for our future.

He added,

I would ask anybody to read this document and say which part of it they don’t agree with. I started by saying that I am not a person of religious faith. I have read that document, and there is nothing in it to which I would not assent. It is something, I think, all educated people should take seriously.

Then  later during the Trojan Horse affair Tim was to intervene, alongside a number of educationalists; all of whom with deep knowledge of Birmingham. They expressed concern about Ofsted’s role and failure to be impartial and independent. This included a letter. In their view those conducting the inspections had been poorly prepared and had a pre-set agenda that called into question Ofsted’s claim to be objective and professional. They pointed out that it was:

beyond belief that schools which were judged less than a year ago to be ‘outstanding’ are now widely reported as ‘inadequate’, despite having the same curriculum, the same students, the same leadership and the same governing body.

For Tim, a major contributory factor in the Trojan Horse affair was the broken system of school governance which had contributed to the situation in Birmingham. He pointed out that in his experience it is quite normal for school governors to misbehave. However, when they do so, usually their colleagues remind them of the respective roles of governors and school professionals. If they still continue with their agenda the local authority would step in, as had happened on a few occasions during his time as the chief education officer. The local authority would work with all the stakeholders to sensitively find a way forward that was the best for the interest of the children and the wider school community.

As senior officers, with the help of local councillors and the Cabinet Member concerned, we would spend many evenings in schools, community venues and Balti houses seeking better understanding of the way forward with both governors and community members on the one hand and head-teachers on the other.

Tim laid the blame for Trojan Horse at the Department for Education. He reminded us that five of the six schools which were labelled as inadequate were academies. More specifically, he singled out the then Secretary of State for Education, Michael Gove, for his failure to use his powers to investigate what was going on in the schools in question, by sending in officials to governing body meetings. For Brighouse, such central control of education meant that communities such as Birmingham were being “treated as a colonial outpost of London”.

My colleague from Birmingham Education, Gilroy Brown, who knew Tim much more than I, has said the following words:

The passing of Prof Tim Brighouse is a great loss to us all and will be felt acutely by those of us who served in Birmingham from mid-90s to early 2000s. He was a breath of fresh air that swept through our city at a time when many of us School leaders felt we needed inspiration and clarity regarding our role as educators .

The terms inspirational, charismatic and catalyst for change aptly describe his character and the difference he made to the educational landscape of Birmingham.

He often challenged leaders to see themselves as the driving force for change and improvement and encouraged teachers to believe that they could change the world. We all believed we could “improve on our previous best “ and improve educational outcomes for our children and there were no barriers that we couldn’t overcome.

He believed there was something unique about every school and therefore endeavoured to visit all of them. The focus was always about the difference we can make in the lives our children, empowering them and making sure that no one is overlooked or forgotten ( the invisible child).

My last communication was earlier this year; with its priceless Tim typo. I met Tim at the launch of Colin Diamond’s edited collection The Birmingham Book, for which I had written a chapter. At the time, along with Professor Tahir Abbas, I was editing our book Ethnicity, Religion, and Muslim Education in a Changing World: Navigating Contemporary Perspectives on Multicultural Schooling in the UK. I asked Tim whether he would consider writing an Afterword. Sadly he declined the invitation.  

Around the time I needed to have a difficult conversation with Tim (and his co-writer Mick Waters). How to do so was the challenge! So, I took the direct approach.

Me: I thought it was a shame that you and Mick, in your recent book ‘About our Schools’ did not talk about the multicultural work done in Birmingham, especially during your time there.  

Tim: I agree …. we found ourselves wanting to make a long book even longer and it left that major hole…you are right to be crtical!! (sic).

I’m just glad that I was able to put my views to him while he was still with us in person. Though in many ways he will always be with us, in our thoughts and in our hearts. He made our (education) world a little better and built foundations for us to build upon. May God bless him, his memory and legacy and comfort his nearest and dearest.

If you would like to add your own memories of Tim, especially on multicultural education in Birmingham, please email me: Karamat@forwardpartnership.org.uk.

Karamat 

One morning in August 2022 I was at my desk doing something or other. The phone rang. Sometimes I ignore such calls from unknown numbers. But this time I decided to answer. I was polite as usual. I was being offered a mobile phone contract. I explained I was currently paying about £10 for a pay-as-you-go per month contract, having come to the end of my previous contract. Of course, I could have continued with the current arrangement. It was a case of ‘it’s not broken’ so I didn’t need to fix it. But clearly I wasn’t thinking.

After a minute or so of the initial sale conversation, I was passed to a colleague who then began to talk me through the phone contract. He went into some detail. After a few minutes I began to get impatient. I just wanted to get back to whatever I had been doing before the call. It was also time to go for my coffee break. During this period of impatience, I probably stopped listening to what I was being told. I do remember agreeing to pay just over £10 per month for a three-year contract. I quickly signed a contract and went for my coffee break.

About a month later, out of the blue, I received £70 into our bank account. I did not understand where this had come from or why. In investigating this I was told by the phone company, OneCom, that this amount was a refund towards my monthly bill, which would be about £80. When I expressed confusion about this it was explained that there was ‘discount’ ‘investment’ of £70 which I would receive for the first 17 months. This raised a question in my mind: what about after 17 months? (as this was a 36 month contract). When I queried the whole arrangement with an agent of the company they extended the ‘discount’ to 24 months.

I explained the full episode to my wife and business partner. I was expecting her to say how stupid I had been or worse. But all she managed was to say words to the effect of “ah well, no one has died”.  Very true.  

I began to think: what about the last 12 months? A couple of months later it was explained in an email that after 24 months I will have the option of entering a further 36 months contract, with a new discount I presume. However, if I did not wish to enter into a new contract then my discount would end, leaving me to pay an additional £70 per month for the remaining 12 months. In an email, a representative of OneCom stated that “I fully appreciate our discount is not the norm”. This made me think: if it is not normal then surely they should have explained the whole think in a more explicit way instead of not even mentioning the word ‘discount’ before I signed the contract, especially as it was going to lead me to pay the additional £70 per month for 12 months. Had they explained the discount arrangement I would not have signed the contract.

So, how am I feeling about all this? Frustrated, angry, stupid, bit of an idiot…. The word depression may be too strong but I was definitely low. I so wanted to turn the clock back so I could undo the whole business. I did not need a new contract. I was fine as I was. But, as they say, ‘it was water under the bridge’. I had signed on the dotted line. I was stuck. For a £10 a month contract I was either stuck with the company for life (by signing a new contract every 24 months) or having to pay an extra £70 per month for the final 12 months; a total of £840.

I live in the present normally. But this was ruining that by taking me into the future. I kept thinking about what would happen after 18 months or 24 months. Do I want to wait till then or do I terminate the contract now? Of course if I took the latter option I would have to pay them even more money, for early cancellation.

Throughout these three or four months I constantly emailed the company. Back and forth. Always polite exchanges, with their customer services people and the secretary of the CEO, who I had tracked down and linked up on LinkedIn. 

How I felt was made worse by me reading horror stories on the internet from other customers with OneCom. So, now I am thinking (isn’t hindsight wonderful): why didn’t I look up the company before I signed the contract!

The frustration and the feeling low (pretty low, for a person who is normally glass half-full) continued. It was all-consuming. I would think about it all my waking hours, especially those moments in the middle of the night when I was trying to go back to sleep.

Of course, as a man of faith I was praying all the time, for God to intervene, to do something, do anything to help. Was he listening to what I was saying?  Along the way I was able to describe the whole episode to the two guys from our church with whom I meet every fortnight to share what is going on in our lives and pray for each other. I remember saying how stupid I felt. To this I was told by one of the men: don’t say that; you are not stupid.  

Then, one day I heard God speak to me; very clearly, as clear as I am about sitting here now writing this blog…. I had just finished my hospital chaplaincy ward round and was sitting there in the waiting room so I could have my Covid jab. At the time, like most days I was having another very LOW moment. Just then I audibly heard a voice which I took to be from God, saying: I’ve got this. So, now God was saying he had heard me, he knew what was going on and he will sort it. Did that help? A little. But I still wanted to go back in time to not make (the stupid) mistake.

I considered writing to the BBC Watchdog. I contacted Citizens Advice. I considered writing the full story and name and shame the company…. I tried my best to persuade OneCom, their CEO, his secretary, their customers service….. I considered writing to my Member of Parliament.

I then decided to complain to OfCom. But it turned out that OneCom were not within their jurisdiction but had their own Complaints System. This did not give me much hope. I didn’t think this would be a system that would give me a fair hearing. Still I tried them. I wrote the full story. They considered whether I had a case for them to take on. They did think I had a case and that they would take it up on my behalf.

My main case was that because the ‘discount’ and its likely end at 24 months had not been made clear to me when I first signed the contract, I wished to terminate the contract, without having to pay any termination charges. Alternatively, I was happy to continue with the contract if the £70 discount was extended to the full 36 months of the full duration of the contract. I also explained to the Adjudicator that I had signed the contract in good faith, based on the phone sales conversation, but without reading the small print of the contract which did explain the ‘discount’. In summary, I was of the view that it was a 36 month contract and I would pay just over £10 per month. Simple.

I waited for the decision by the Adjudicator. They took a few weeks before reaching their decision. I expected bad news. So, I began to prepare for it. Occasionally I would remind myself of what God had promised. It helped a little, to get me through my days.

The Adjudicator decided in my favour. They instructed the company to terminate my contract, after making sure that, over the 8 months duration of the contract I only pay £10.70 per month. I was owed over a £100 which I was pleased to have refunded.

There was a bonus! The month following the resolution of my case, I received my normal £70 discount. I wrote to the company to inform them of this, expecting they would expect a refund. They didn’t. Instead they wrote to me to say I could keep the money. But then the same happened the month after. Again I wrote to them to inform them of this discount money. I did not hear from them. So, I ended up benefiting from £140. By this time I had a new phone contract with a different company which was below £10 a month. Moreover, my OneCom contract had come free membership of Amazon Prime. I have tried to cancel this but have not been able to. So, I continue to have this free membership and probably will have it for 36 months.

In conclusion…

The episode has renewed my faith in our systems, such as, adjudication.

I have learnt that next time someone phones me to sell me something I shall be less trusting and less quick to enter into a contract.

And, maybe, next time God says, “I’ve got this”, I will be more trusting.