Over the past few months, Britain’s leading broadcasters have come under fire for their lack of diversity both in front of and behind the camera. Comedian Lenny Henry criticised the media, suggesting that more needs to be done to increase Black and Minority Ethnic (BAME) representation both on and off the screen.
This week, popular broadcaster Sky, who have several entertainment channels to their name, have unveiled plans to improve their levels of diversity in order to better represent ethnic minority groups.
Sky’s director of entertainment, Stuart Murphy, revealed that the broadcaster will ensure that 20 per cent of their onscreen and off-screen employees will be ethnic minorities by 2015, including its writers. In addition, one fifth of actors on all of Sky’s new shows will also have BAME backgrounds.
This new diversity target, which will exclude Sky news, will is likely to affect over 100 of Sky’s shows across a range of its channels, including Sky Living, Sky 1 and Sky Arts. Through the implementation of this scheme, Sky aims to “create a huge creative bounce”.
The decision to increase the number of ethnic minorities to 20 per cent trumps the announcement the BBC made last month to ensure that 15 per cent of its employees will be BAMEs ( a reflection of the number of ethnic minorities in the UK), which seeks to make up for years of underrepresentation.
“Targets feel necessary after years of training courses and initiatives,” Murphy stated, adding: “Ideally they will serve their purpose and be unnecessary in the long run, though we set them with one goal in mind; to focus all our collective energies on rebalancing the representation that has, despite best efforts, not achieved what we have all hoped to achieve. Hopefully this is just the start of making that permanent change happen.”
Sky will also be introducing a 12-month internship within the company to one ethnic minority as part of its Creative Diversity Programme.
Culture Minister Ed Vaizey praised Sky’s proposed targets, saying: “It’s great to see Sky leading the way and ensuring that the diverse society we live in is reflected both in front of and behind the camera. This is a very positive move and I applaud its commitment to bring through new talent from all walks of life.”
