News - Armed Forces LGBT Conferences

RN SPONSORED TRI-SERVICE LGB CONFERENCE
THE GASCOIGNE ROOM, UNION JACK CLUB, FRI 26/SAT 27 JAN 07

SUMMARY OF PROCEEDINGS

The Conference commenced at 1505 with a total of 38 delegates - inclusive of speakers and guests – and Rear Admiral Richard Ibbotson RN (Naval Secretary) as the VIP. Rear Admiral Ibbotson opened the conference by welcoming all attendees and spoke of his pride in being invited as VIP to such an important event. He also extended the very best wishes of 2SL to all those in attendance.

The conference then continued with speakers from the Equal Opportunities and Diversity Desks (EO & D) of each service.

ROYAL NAVY E&D

Graham Beard was the first to speak for the Royal Navy and spoke about the following subjects:

The RN EO&D plan of action includes a desire to ensure active involvement of personnel at all levels of the plan. It is important for the right people to have their input and this involvement will be sought as an ongoing process.

JSP 763 – Harassment procedures – This publication is clear in the process that should be followed when an individual is being subject to harassment. These problems can only be correctly dealt with and, consequently, fully stamped out if individuals step forward as victims. Silence will lead to the belief by the authorities that there is not a problem and so nothing will be done.

Equal Opportunities & Diversity Training – This is currently under review with the aim of hitting issues and finding better avenues of communicating the problems and issues that still remain.

Allied with updating the training methods, a new EO & D Policy statement will be issued in due course and JSP 763 will be completely updated.
The following issues are being reviewed:

Clear directives on the display of pin-ups and pornography.
Impact assessment – The quality assurance of ALL policies.
Awareness of conflicting freedoms where one is sacrificed to ensure that another is being fully catered for.
Gender equality in the carrying out of duties.

Career monitoring – There is a need to monitoring individuals who transgress the acceptable and the best methods are currently being sought.

As part and parcel of the listed issues, the Royal Navy, through the EO&D cell, is looking to encourage the correct form of leadership at all levels, to encourage individuals to have the moral courage to stand up for their rights and to ensure that the correct behaviour, allied with the right attitude toward minority personnel, is evident at all times.
Transsexualism – A Tri-service working group is being set up to ensure that transsexuals have a specific inclusion in all relevant policies.

Finally, Graham was keen to point out that anybody is free to contact the Equal Opportunities & Diversity team at any time. He went on to add that it is imperative that we strengthen the reliable support networks for minority personnel so that bad practices, offensive attitudes and examples of bullying and associated behaviours are reported at the earliest opportunity.

ARMY E&D

From the Army EO & D Desk, Liz Nelson spoke briefly of the current progress being made within their service:

The Army are working closely with the other services to ensure that procedures are being carried out correctly and that a fluid route for communication is being constructed.

ROYAL AIR FORCE E&D

Richard Castle stepped up to speak for the RAF EO & D cell.

Raising the question of whether we were here to discuss the views of others toward minority groups: the perception that others have of ‘minority’ individuals, the attitudes toward these people, the level of ignorance that exists. Or was there something more fundamental?

Looking through a brief history of man, it seems that things have come full circle from an ‘ignorance is bliss’ start point regarding personal habits and preferences to the need now for all to be equal, no matter what you do or who you are.

The RAF Desk want the minority perspective on whether or not there is a threat to other RAF personnel. They want to know if Gay personnel are comfortable walking into a mess with their partner?

He went on to state that the RAF view on uniform at ‘Europride’ was down to their policy of not wearing uniform at any event which is viewed as being a political event or march.

The RAF will join the Stonewall workplace index in February 2007, allowing a clear method of gauging the true commitment to equality in the service.

Key issues that the RAF want to see tackled are:

- There should be a clear tri-service pro-active policy on the issues and these policies need to be discussed at regular meetings between the services.
- What should the LGB agenda be? This would allow the RAF to decide on a clear focus and direction.
- To ensure that there is not an EO & D fatigue or overload.

MOD LGBT Committee

The conference then continued with a brief talk from Sandra Docking and Ian Romanis from the MOD LGBT Steering committee.

Sandra commenced by explaining that the organisation was made up of volunteers but existed in an official capacity. MOD personnel were generally happy to be ‘out’ at work and that the biggest problem that their members faced was the issue of interaction between themselves and their workmates and bosses.

With these factors in mind they were looking primarily at the subjects of monitoring the numbers of LGBT personnel, encouraging human interaction rather than regulating people and imposing strict rules to adhere to, reporting discrimination where satisfactory outcomes had not always been guaranteed, and to let people know that they are not alone.

STONEWALL DIVERSITY CHAMPIONS

After the tea break, Stephen Frost, Director of workplace programmes at Stonewall clarified 4 important actions that an organisation can do to get things right:

Be a top class employer - Be prepared to embrace all personnel.
Improve Recruitment – Do the right thing in the right places.
Improve Productivity – Remember that people perform better when they can be themselves.
Risk mitigation – Ensure that you are doing all that you can to stop the wrongs things from happening.

He finished by speaking of the amazing sight of 22 Royal Navy personnel marching at Europride last summer – possibly one of the most impressive sights that he had ever seen.

SEXUAL ORIENTATION MONITORING

Katherine Cowan, Stonewall policy and information officer then took the stand with a presentation on Monitoring.

This was divided into 4 main areas:

1. What does monitoring tell an employer?

Which groups of people are applying and being recruited in specific jobs.
The balance of promotion.
The level of happiness and contentment amongst the workforce.
Do minority groups feel comfortable at work?
Do these minority groups feel able to report problems?

2. What are the benefits of monitoring?

Employees feel that they can communicate their thoughts.
Employer has an increased awareness of what is going on around the workplace.
There is a boost to recruitment, retention and productivity.
The company reputation becomes stronger.
It becomes easier to identify and to tackle discrimination.

3. How and with what aims is monitoring carried out?

The process for monitoring must be thought through and this must include organisational involvement.
Senior support is essential and will determine how thorough the monitoring is.
The aims and objectives must be decided beforehand.
The level of confidentiality must be considered.

4. How is the collected data to be utilised?

This will depend totally on the needs of the company and what the aim of the monitoring is.

A point of note here is that females often prefer to work for ‘non macho’ organisations that put the welfare of their employees at the top of their list of priorities. An employer that is keen to monitor, to act on the information and to ensure equality throughout the workplace is therefore, going to be able to select and recruit from a larger pool of quality personnel.

PROUD2SERVE UPDATE

Phil Johnston then gave a brief summary on the current role that proud2serve.net is having within the GLBT community in the armed forces.

Membership continues to climb and the site provides a healthy forum for discussing topics that affect its members.

As usual, there was no disputing the important role that the website has to play in the Armed forces GLBT community and it was felt that the site should continue to hold this position and that it should be supported more by the forces in an official manner.

This completed day one of the conference.

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