Having been in this country since the 60`s I actually feel I am British and belong to this country as well as its culture. However trying to work in this country without experiencing racism has been a very difficult path, one that has made me realize that I don’t want my children to go through what I have been though.

I therefore am constantly looking for an opportunity where I can leave and take my expertise and experiences elsewhere. Somewhere where I won’t be judged by the colour of my skin, but by the content of my work.

I guess I did experience racism when I was young, and still at school. I remembered not being picked to be a prefect, and one of my white female friends asked the head teacher why no Asians had been picked to be prefects, and was told that `they are not good enough`. I tried not to let it affect me and didn’t always realise I was experiencing it. My memories and the effect of racism to my career has now left me realising that it exists all around me every day in the workplace, at school and even when doing what I most enjoy – running. I have had abuse thrown at me whilst jogging, even eggs thrown at my by white women, and even cigarettes flicked at me.

This started as early as 1990 when I was the only black Asian employee of a transmission company made redundant after 18 months of working with them, whilst the remainder of the company with over 300 employees remained in their jobs, and no other engineers lost their job. The unions tried to prove was how could I have been made redundant when initially I was the first engineer to be employed and helped to set the station up, in its initial stage of being set up. With only a few days left to go to IT. The company settled out of court having still not given any strong reason. This has left me for a whole year without any jobs and my personal life disrupted.

Another experience was when my colleagues at another small company started taunting me with messages. I got messages left on the microwaves stating `don’t eat your smelly food in here`, etc. They even set me up to where my work was being tampered with, and I began to doubt myself. It was only when I took it up with head office that a white member of staff was sent down to investigate the situation, and concluded that the engineers I was working with were racist. Once again I was forced to leave and move on.

My experiences in this profession continued when I worked for another big transmission company.  I joined this company thinking they would look after me, as they were so big and would care for the welfare of the employees. However, I was very wrong. I experienced racism from the minute I joined it, and it got worse from there on.  Post September 11th, the issues that I faced every time I was at work, were very depressing. Colleagues were allowed to point at the TV screen and made comments that names like ‘Mohammed` were all terrorists.  Small comments were thrown at me for being a Muslim. All this was allowed to take place, whilst management carried on allowing the staff to say whatever they wished. My personal development was also hindered, when I was only engineer not allowed to go on courses whilst every other engineer attended internal and external ones.  My confidence was killed; I was given no pay rise, and was left to feel I was worthless. Even though I shared my views with my line manager, nothing was ever done to rectify the situation. I finally left the company to work elsewhere.  How do you fight a battle with such big corporations, which have the best barristers, and can buy their way out of anything?   My unions would not even take my case forward as they felt they didn’t stand a chance.

To conclude I can only say yes, racism does exist, companies know it exists, and they want you to turn a blind eye and carry on regardless. But how do you carry on when you know on some occasions you have better skills than your white counterpart, better knowledge, and better expertise, but not the right colour? You are stopped from being promoted, not allowed to go on courses, but worse still not allowed to be yourself.  You are expected to adapt to their way of life, is that fair?  Why should I lose my identity when I have done nothing wrong, except to be born with a different skin colour?

Anon

If you or anyone else you know has experienced racism, please contact SREC for free advice and support