Hello and welcome to The Rundown, the weekly podcast from Politics Home. I'm your host,

Shelle Mataluko. And here with me on the Black History Month episode of Politics Home is

Sean Bailey, London Assembly member and former Conservative London mayoral candidate,

Chauvonne Arons, co-founder of Conservatives Against Racism for Equality, and a founding

trustee of the Black Equity Organisation, and Jermaine Jackman, singer, Troublemaker, co-chair

of Hackney's Young Futures Commission, a founding member of the

Burbab Foundation, and a member of the 1987 Caucus, a collective working to increase black male

representation in the Labour Party. Our topic for today's episode, what is like to be black in

Britain in 2022.

Sean, I'll start with you.

Thank you. I think when I was younger, I'm talking like, you know, pre-10, being black in Britain was openly tougher. As much, people were openly racist. Where I used to live, I come

from Labric Grove, West London. They used to be an NF office in the estate, just like the road for us, just, you know, with posters and everything. It was the norm. People

accepted these things. And having a white friend was a danger to you and them. So clearly in that sense,

things have moved on, you know, and if you speak to my uncle, who's again older than me, he'll talk about no blacks, no Irish, no dogs.

So we're not in that situation anymore.

I think the situation we're in now is much more complicated because you've had black people who've been actively excluded from things, so anything from bank loans right up to school.

I remember speaking to my grandparents and then pointing out to me that black people

when they arrived, sort of win rush generation, we were the property owning class. We owned more

property than our white counterparts somewhere along the way that was lost and there's a whole

conversation. But there is an element of racism in there, but there's also an element of community

breakdown in there.

And when I talk about where we are now, yes, you can point out to physical facts, the poor performance of black children in school, black boys in particular. And yes, you could, you can

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