Project Manager Kath Jones Delegates in the 'Marketplace'
and speaker Margaret Mitchell
Birkenhead meets Bremen: The story of the mid term conference of the Partnership for Diverse Workforces.
As with all Equal funded work there is a European aspect to the work and this is the story of the Birkenhead based English projects recent attendance at the mid term conference in Bremen. The Partnership for Diverse Workforces (PDW) is the Trans national partnership between four European DP’s, the Swedish ‘Make your Future’, the German ‘Employment and Qualification for Ethnic Minorities’ the Danish ‘Clarification of real Work Competences’ DP’s and the English Healthcare ESOL DP. All of the DP’s are looking at different ways in which people disadvantaged by ethnicity, language, culture or religion from minority or disadvantaged communities can be helped into employment. The conference brought together delegates from all of the four partnerships with 12 delegates representing our English DP. These were from the London and the North West Development Agencies, SHA’s and their successor bodies, another Mental Health Trust as well as a CWPNT representative and project staff.
The first day started with a welcome in English from Hamide Nasseri the conference organiser who announced that the language for the conference was English and that all the study visits would have English speakers at the various venues. This was a relief to the majority of the English delegates! Hamide introduced the first speaker who was her director from the Bremen Department for Work, Women, Health Young People and Social Services, Doctor Saul Revel. He welcomed delegates and then gave an interesting insight into the demographics and the history of immigrant workers in the City State of Bremen Bremerhaven.
The next speaker was Peer Gillner from the German Evaluators who in a presentation ‘’ Four ways to put Diversity into practice’’ - a comparison of the work of the four partner countries, described the differences and similarities in the
partner countries Equal projects and how the economic, social and cultural differences had led to different approaches being adopted.
After coffee the English contributor Margaret Mitchell presented ‘’ The Road to Equality’’ a perspective on the GB approach. She acknowledged the help given to her by Ian Gittens the Diversity adviser to the DP and excluded him from any mistakes or personally held views expressed in the paper. She looked at the history of immigration into the UK and how different approaches were adopted that, depending on the prevailing economic, social and cultural circumstances, meant we expected integration or assimilation into the indigenous population or attempted to recognise and even celebrate cultural diversity, with each phase accompanied by legislation to protect minority communities. The current situation is a challenging one and she contended that the challenge for us now is to have an honest adult debate that included all of our society.
The Danish partners speaker was Bjarne Hendriksen who talked about their project ‘’ Clarifying Real Competencies by using thematic project organised casework’’. This approach to accrediting real life competencies mirrors the accrediting of prior competencies familiar to trainers in this country. In the afternoon there was a presentation by Swedish partners about ‘’Empowerment as a Strategy’’ and the day concluded with a summary of the day from the Danish project leader.
Days two and three were taken up with study visits to some of the Equal projects in Bremen. The delegates were given a choice of projects to visit and all visited a total of three. These included projects about the integration of ethnic minorities into the healthcare sector, learning and working in neighbourhoods, multicultural integration in the service and healthcare sector, Intercultural competence for the labour market and two particularly interesting projects one about ‘’follow up qualifications for non- German nursing professionals ‘’ and the other about ‘’Language Cultural Mediators for Health Care and Work’’ The delegates had the opportunity to visit an eldercare complex and to speak with non German nationals at a vocational college. The interaction and information exchange between delegates from the four partner countries and the German projects was the most interesting aspect of the whole trip for many people. A full copy of all the papers and more information about the conference will be available from the Equal project team.
A DP Delegates perspective
