Lord Bill Morris Visits PATRA Inc ACDA
In 1991 Bill Morris was elected General Secretary of the T&G by a postal ballot of members. He was the first black general secretary of a trade union and arguably one of the most influential black people in Britain.
But he made clear that he did not wish to be known or judged as a black General Secretary: as he said at the time of his election,
" I am not the black candidate, rather the candidate who is black." In 1995 he was re-elected to the post of General Secretary. Bill served on a wide range of national bodies including the Advisory Councils of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) and Idependent Broadcasting Authority (IBA) and was appointed to the Economic and Social Affairs Committee of the European Union.
He is currently a member of the Employment Appeals Tribunal, The TUC General Council, The Advisory Committee of The Prince's Youth Business Trust, The Trustee Board of the Open University Foundation, The Governing Council of Atlantic College, The Courts of Nene College and Luton University, and The Board of Governors of South Bank University. His most recent appointment is as a non-executive Director of the Bank of England. He is a fellow of The RSA and The City and Guilds of London Institute and he holds honorary degrees from a number of British Universities. Lord Bill Morris also Chancellor of the University of Technology in Jamaica was awarded The Order of Jamaica in 2002 and recieved a Knighthood in the 2003 Queens Birthday honours list. In April 2006 it was announced that Morris would take a seat in The House of Lords.
On Friday the 17th October 2008, Lord Morris visited Nottingham. His first meeting was at the Nottingham Trent University. He then held a radio interview at KEMET radio station alongside Professor Cecile Wright talking about their respective roles as prominent African Caribbean people.
Later that morning he arrived at The Marcus Garvey Centre where he unveiled a plaque commemorating 25 years of the The Marcus Garvey Centre. For the rest of the afternoon he met with The Chair and members of PATRA Inc ACDA's board, followed by general discussion and took questions from the group rather than doing a speech, He set the agenda for discussion based around Economics, Social Issues, Education, Health, Building Citizenship, Enhancing Capacity and the Community.
QUESTIONS & ANSWERS
Why should we engage in the system in order to see equality? and what bearing has it got to do in terms of supporting young and giving aid to our young people?
"If life is not meeting our needs, we should set out to change, sometimes moving on making a constitution & demand it (change)."
The REACH report made recommendations that there should be more black role models as mentors. As a result of the REACH report, government are now commissioning an organisation to come up with black role models. Should government be doing this or is this something we should be doing ourselves from our own community?
" I agree that we shouldn't sit back and wait for govenment or any other institution, self help is the best form of help. I am not convinced that the answer to our problems in equality within education is going to be corrected on the basis of a few role models, its a contribution not the solution,, the best role models you can have are you parent's."
Black people spend is more than their white counterparts, but still we are at the bottom of the economic ladder. What do you feel is a way how we can look at this lack of economic power, is it through training,education etc?
"I am a great believer in political change, use the system to bring about change. We need to build on existing structure such as The Princes Trust.
I believe in social & economical liberation as a way of solving issues that affects the black community."
Black underachievers at school; are we past that stage now or are we still underachieveing?
"Girls are not underachieving but boys are, so we are partially succeeding.
We need to examine underperformance of certain sections in our community for the next generation."
Silence within the black community surrounding gangs, gun crime and territorialism. The silence gives the impression that we are condoning these crime of actions.
" Just speaking about it alone wont make it stop. We need to go beyond speaking out. The methods and tools should be radical. A conference telling parents that we feel they are not doing enough would be a good start. Having a gun shop in an area with high gun crime is an insult to our community, why should guns be on display like that? The govenment needs to do something about this, in fact I will be telling the Home Office as this needs to change"
" I do hope that PATRA Incorporatating ACDA continues to develop and builds partnerships, looking at opportunities they provide and economical development aiming towards transforming the concept of black people looking for work to being providers of work."