European Social Fund in England

Case study: Fair Cities

Fair Cities is an employment initiative running in Bradford, Birmingham and the London Borough of Brent. The project is a partnership between Jobcentre Plus and the Learning and Skills Council, with the support of the European Social Fund. It aims to increase the number of disadvantaged ethnic minority residents who gain employment by:

• meeting employers' demands for candidates who are ready to do the job;
• encouraging employers to have fair and effective processes for recruiting and promoting employees;
• helping the employment and skills system to respond more effectively to the needs of businesses and ethnic minorities;
• testing the effectiveness and value for money of the approach to tackling disadvantage and discrimination in the workforce; and
• making sure the most important and successful parts of the Fair Cities trial and the lessons learned from it are built into standard employment schemes.

In Birmingham, ESF funds Fair Cities pre-employment courses to help people from ethnic minorities to apply for jobs and prepare for interviews. One of the people taking part is Manjit. Manjit had taken time out from work to have children and contacted Fair Cities after seeing an advert in the local free newspaper. After an initial discussion with the Fair Cities employer engagement manager, Manjit took part in a pre-employment course. Fair Cities then arranged an interview for her with a local building society. Manjit was successful at the interview and joined the building society permanently. Manjit said "I don't think I would have been working today if it hadn't been for Fair Cities, it gave me a doorway, a gateway into work."