Despite what Eric Pickles the Communities secretary would have us believe multiculturalism is not dead. I believe that we have reached a point in the debate about multiculturalism and community cohesion which reinforces the role of local authorities.Increasingly we are becoming a more diverse country and we are becoming more aware of the need to take account of culture and faith in delivering service to the whole community.In the past local authorities have given grants to voluntary organisations who provide services to people from minority ethnic and religious groups in recognition of their own failure to proved appropriate services. When these were small amounts of money providing low level, small scale services it hardly seemed important to establish exactly who was receiving a service it was enough that more sections of the community were benefiting than would otherwise.Two things have changed a bigger role for the Community/Voluntary and Faith sector in providing services in which small grants become big contacts and these services no longer supplement local authority services but replace them. Secondly a concern about the philosophy behind these services, who can access them and whether they are outward looking organisations supporting good community relations or inward looking.We have reached a point in the debate about multiculturalism and community cohesion which reinforces the role of local authorities in influencing how these organisations operate. In practical terms this means the local authority should influence through grants and contracting arrangements. However these are blunt instruments and it is more effective to develop a partnership approach where the local authority is represented on the management board and gets involved in the running of the service.In a previous post I helped bring together a number of small voluntary groups within the Chinese community all of whom were competing for small grants none of whom had suitable premises to operate the service they wanted to provide and none had the infrastructure or expertise to run anything other than a small scale advice service and luncheon club. In return for access to a purpose built day centre, office accommodation and guaranteed funding to staff the service we reached agreement on a management board that had representatives from each of the groups and the local authority. The local authority was to be involved in the recruitment of all staff and the recruitment process was to follow local authority best practice thus avoiding any concerns about nepotism. The local authority provided a finance officer seconded part time to provide financial advice to the centres management team and board. The local authority also provided access to training for staff. This model could have all sorts of variations but the common characteristic would be very hands on approach from the Local Authority. Of course this does mean the faith/voluntary/community group gives up some independence and control in order to gain greater and more secure funding and not all small groups will consider this acceptable. I was in negotiations with one such group over a number of years trying to persuade them to accept this type of partnership but despite shared agreement on the needs of the local community they consistently maintained a position which was in effect "just give us the money and let us get on with it."Blair McPherson author of An Elephant in the Room an equality and diversity training manual and Equipping Managers for an Uncertain Future both published by http://www.russellhouse.co.uk/
