At the end of September, a coalition designed to strengthen equality, diversity and inclusion in the construction industry was launched. Called the Construction Inclusion Coalition (CIC), it was founded by the chief executives of nine groups* and those of two employers' organisations in the sector (Builders Merchants Federation and National Merchant Buying Society). Angela Rushforth, CIC chair and Managing Director of Toolstation, a subsidiary of Travis Perkins, spoke to mind RH about the origins of this coalition, whose members employ over 250,000 people.
Why did you create this unprecedented coalition?
I’ve been in construction for quite a long time and one of the things that we were doing within my own organisation was establishing a women’s network. And when we were listening to women, and see also the challenges that they were having, a lot of people were saying “oh, it’s just the industry.” It was almost used as an excuse and therefore, for me, it was about: “Actually, we need to change the industry!” So, I had a look around in terms of what other industries were doing and I spoke to someone who was in insurance and discovered they have established a coalition of leading organisations to support E, D & I (equity, diversity and inclusion).
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