It’s Not Our Families, It’s Our City: Why the New Inequality Review Must Examine the System

In June we hand delivered a letter signed by nearly 600 residents asking Brighton & Hove City Council to run an independent review after national research found that children eligible for Free School Meals living in communities in the east of the city have some of the worst education and employment outcomes in England. 

We have kept up the pressure and last Friday Jacob Taylor - Deputy Leader of the majority Labour council - announced that there will be a review of inequality in the city. It will include those with lived experience alongside experts in the city and voices from outside. 

We very much welcome this news. It cannot be right that a place that prides itself on being inclusive and fair has areas where only 4% of children on FSM grow up to get a degree and fewer than half find stable employment as adults. 

A Review That Only Looks at the Symptoms Will Fail

However, any review into inequality is not doing its job if it only explores the lives of the poorest and fails to examine how those with privilege and power contribute to this status quo. Furthermore, we strongly urge the review to examine how the culture and actions of past and present leaders of our institutions - of local government, business, education, and other key services - have contributed to locking thousands of poor children into lives they would not accept for their own. 

We have requested more details about the review. In the meantime, we will continue to advocate for a review that asks tough questions of those in power, rather than one that - as usual, allows responsibility to be pushed downwards, avoiding scrutiny where it is desperately needed.

After all, poor children across nearly every other constituency in England get better life outcomes than poor children in the east of our city. That’s not about our families, it’s about our city and its systems.