Simon Isherwood, the conductor with West Midlands Trains (WMT) who lost his job after asking whether such a thing as ‘black privilege’ exists in African countries like Ghana (which is 95% black), has given an interview to the Mail in which he describes the ordeal he’s been put through. I know a bit about Simon’s case because the Free Speech Union helped him bring a case against WMT in the Employment Tribunal. Earlier this week, the judge found that Simon had been unfairly dismissed and he is now in line for a five figure pay-out. Here’s how the interview begins:
Railway manager Simon Isherwood was so passionate about his job with West Midlands Trains, he was known to his line manager as ‘Mr. Northampton.’
There was nothing he didn’t know about train services to and from the market town.
Starting his career more than 11 years ago as a train conductor, Mr. Isherwood, 60, had risen through the ranks – twice winning awards along the way for going beyond the call of duty in customer service.
As manager of a diverse team of around 25 conductors, he liked to think of himself as someone who has always treated everyone fairly and equally regardless of colour, creed, gender or sexuality.
It was his idea to invite everyone in his team to take part in a morale-boosting ‘feel-good’ video during lockdown, set to the Billy Ocean song When The Going Gets Tough, which attracted 4,400 views on You Tube.
When the company then asked him to put forward two conductors for a poster campaign welcoming commuters back after lockdown, Mr. Isherwood’s first choice was a young man from Pakistan – simply because he was his best employee.
“I loved my job and there was nothing I wouldn’t have done for that company,” says Mr. Isherwood, proud of the way he as a manager judged others on merit and job performance alone.
“From the day I started I’d never had anything but promotion, praise and awards. They knew that if something went wrong I’d be the first one on the scene.”
So Mr. Isherwood was devastated when he was sacked by West Midlands Trains from his £49,000-a-year job for gross misconduct at a disciplinary hearing in March last year.
His crime? He’d forgotten to turn off his microphone following a diversity and inclusion online webinar, which he attended voluntarily at home after his morning shift at the station, on the subject of ‘white privilege’.
To his acute embarrassment, other managers – still logged on after the team talk ended – overheard Mr. Isherwood saying to his wife: “I couldn’t be a**ed because I thought, ‘You know what, I’ll just get f•••ing angry.’”
The private conversation went on: “You know what I really wanted to ask?… and I wish I had, do they have black privilege in other countries? So, if you’re in Ghana?”
Suspended the same day following a complaint by a manager from sister company East Midlands Trains, which organised the webinar, a mortified Mr. Isherwood apologised profusely to his bosses for the microphone lapse, his swearing and any unintended offence.
He insisted the first part of the conversation did not relate to the webinar at all but was in response to a note his wife had placed in front of him, asking, ‘Have you phoned the oven man?’ because their appliance was broken.
Yes, he admitted, he’d felt a little annoyed and insulted by some aspects of the webinar, presented by an outside consultant who was white, which seemed – to him at least – to suggest that all white people are born inherently racist.
His question about ‘black privilege’ – he maintained – was not intended as criticism or mockery of the webinar, but as a genuine one intended to help him understand better.
“We’d been asked to think of questions and I was just doing what I was told,” he says.
Worth reading in full – not least because Simon’s story is typical of the kind we hear every week at the Free Speech Union. Those who dismiss cancel culture as a culture war trope invented by conservatives in an attempt to cast themselves as victims often point to high-profile people like J.K. Rowling who don’t appear to have suffered any financial loss in spite of being targeted for cancellation. In fact, the vast majority of the victims of cancel culture are exactly like Simon – ordinary people whose lives have been destroyed after a handful of woke activists (or just one, in Simon’s case) urge their employers to punish them for dissenting from progressive orthodoxy.
And if you think you might be fired for challenging woke gobbledegook, join the Free Speech Union. Membership fees start at £2.49 a month.
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You’ve moved to Halton? You’ve already “gone native” – only a Scouser calls “Home Bargains” Home and Bargain”!
Hate Not Hope – Underlying principle of Sir Two-Tier’s government.
I keep hearing Zia Farage UK is soaring in the polls but every time I look Zia Farage UK is on 25%, slightly ahead or slightly behind Labour.
It’s not hard to imagine the Zia Farage UK is the establishment’s choice to form the next government to give the appearance of democracy. They’ll be a few token tax cuts, the boats will magically stop, maybe a referendum on ECHR and Net Zero, which will be ignored like the Brexit vote. Nothing much will really change.
Britain needs restoration not “reform”. Every single law made since 1997 should be repealed, every quango closed, and the police force and judiciary need rebuilding from scratch.
Very good.
I do agree, but maybe reform is the only other choice for now! Rather Reform headed by a donkey than the uniparty headed by the living dead!
Indeed. Quite a few laws made before 1997 should be repealed too, IMO. The question is, is there any appetite among the wider public for such a program? I don’t think there is, though it would be good to see someone try. Rupert Lowe certainly sounded like he was thinking along these lines.
40% of the electorate didn’t vote last time.
True but I doubt that many of those 40% would vote for the kind of program you are advocating. I may of course be wrong and it would be great to find out.
That’s because they are in despair of their vote making any difference.
And no wonder, when the votes of British citizens are swamped and overwhelmed by the Outrageous Commonwealth Voting Rights in British Elections, by citizens of 56 foreign countries!
The heroic campaigners who founded “Migration Watch”, former UK Ambassador Lord Andrew Green and Oxford Professor David Coleman, have been trying to wake up the public for years to ABOLISH THE COMMONWEALTH VOTING RIGHTS in UK elections. All to no avail, because the media and politicians conceal it, and the public won’t listen.
I’ve never heard of the Commonwealth Voting Rights.
Yes, of course there is an “appetite” among the public starving for change! They’ve just been waiting for some bold new ideas, like a lantern in the darkness, showing the way.
I hope you are right
100%.
Hear, hear! Well said, the Lockdown Sceptic! And that’s an apt new name for Reform: “Zia Farage UK”. I like it!
Astoundingly, it is being predicted that around 35% of the votes (obv not the local electorate since many won’t bother) will go to the Labour Party which makes it so clear it despises them.
They can’t ALL be Public Sector employees and/or Muslims, can they?
What excuse do the rest of them have?
They’re the professional unemployed …
I dunno, The people of Canada voted in Carney! nothing suprises me anymore
Indeed. Tragic.
Not really. According to the BBC, it’s hung parliament with the Liberals having exactly as many seats (168) as all other parties together.
Trump’s persistent attempts to be the playground bully who keeps whining about being bullied all the time while smashing other kid’s toys left, right and center were bound to help politicians opposed to him. That’s a political classic: In case of trouble at home, make war on a foreign country. Still helps if it’s only a rethorical war.
Indeed they hate their own voters, as did (and probably still do) the Fake Conservatives, as famously pointed out by Hitchens on Question Time, talking about “Slippery Dave” Cameron. Worth searching out the clip on YouTube just to see Justine Greening’s face.
Excellent article by Steven Tucker, and a nice photo of Nigel with Reform’s new Trojan Horse.
Reform UK’s Runcorn candidate welcomed Syrian and Afghan refugees – but now ‘fully supports net zero immigration’
Councillor expelled from Cheshire East Conservative group – Cheshire Live
“Cllr Sarah Pochin has been expelled by Cheshire East Tories after she agreed to become mayor when the Independents and Labour voted for her”
Remember: A Vote for Reform is a Vote for the Caliphate
Classic Farage – shit all over the local party by dumping some outsider on them.
Maybe it’s just me, but why does Farage seem to always wander about with very dark sunglasses on – not being able to see the whites of peoples eyes is not good to build trust… hasn’t anyone told him that?
Maybe it’s because of that nasty Only Fans prostitute who threw a milkshake in his eyes, temporarily blinding him, as he described his shock afterward, since he didn’t know whether the liquid was something acid or toxic.
I don’t blame him for taking precautions now by wearing sunglasses.
A great deal of party politics in the UK, especially in cities, has been ‘Machine Politics’.
Wikipedia:
But the Conservatives have lost their machine power, and Labour are realising that their machine power is running away through their fingers. Reform and various Muslim organisations are picking up the disaffected. I guess ‘Machine Politics’ wins – until the machine becomes worn out and breaks down.
Before scoffing at the healing power of crystals perhaps the author should think about crystal radios. Crystals do have healing powers, only those irredeemably wedded to prescription drugs think otherwise