Last month saw the publication of the long awaited Morrow Report providing Scottish Ministers with advice and perspective on the future direction of anti-sectarianism policy.
One of its most interesting lines states 'many senior and influential people across society' had failed to acknowledge the problem or show the leadership required to tackle it.
There is a danger in allowing this to be viewed simply as a historical failing. 'Institutional sectarianism' can still be found and it thrives when left to lurk in the shadows, unchallenged and overlooked.
Those who posses sectarian attitudes mutter darkly and like to give the impression that they alone represent the hopes and fears of their respective communities. They tell us things have always been this way. They rely on our apathy, apprehension and reluctance to become involved.
The hardest set of barriers to dismantle are those we allow others to build in our heads and for too long 'Civic Scotland' displayed a marked reluctance to properly address sectarianism.
Yet, there is huge potential for institutions, particularly within the public sector, to reinforce the message that bigotry's had its day.
In 2011 Nil by Mouth launched our 'Beyond Religion and Belief' project seeking to raise awareness of sectarianism in the workplace. Since then we have been reminded of the challenges many people still face: the teacher overlooked for promotion, the nurse abused in an A&E ward because of the colour of their tabard or the name on their ID badge, staff frozen out when overtime is available or the office worker constantly subjected to 'banter' from colleagues.
In 2012 City of Edinburgh Council became the first local authority to sign up to participate and we have since worked with hundreds of its staff. The partnership has been a success and feedback has been extremely positive yet other local authorities seem hesitant to become involved. Why is this? Do they feel that it isn't a problem or is it easier to avoid the elephant in the room? It's not as if there isn't evidence of problems: several councils have had to discipline staff for sectarian behaviour over recent years yet when approached, they inform us that there isn't a problem and things are being dealt with 'internally'.
Ignoring a problem doesn't make it go away and that is why we have contacted more than 100 public bodies offering to work with their staff, managers, HR departments and equality officers to ensure everyone is clear what's not acceptable in a 21st-century workplace.
There is also currently a procurement bill making its way through Holyrood which seeks to ensure public sector contracts and practices maximise wider social benefits and objectives. Surely, it's possible to insert a clause in this bill that would ensure any successful bidder for lucrative public sector contracts must have a stated anti-sectarian policy and offer awareness training to staff?
Neither of these proposals carry any real financial cost and would help provide protection for staff and clarity for employers. By signing up to these practical and cost-effective measures our institutions can help chase sectarianism out of the shadows once and for all.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article