The
Cabinet Office has launched a recruitment drive to attract ethnic minority
undergraduates into its fast-track development scheme.
An outreach scout has been appointed to visit university campuses to sign up
ethnic minority students for a summer programme familiarising them with a
career in Whitehall.
The scout, Faisal Naru, a 24-year-old graduate, will be seeking 60 student
trainees to enter the programme. They will get paid placements in Whitehall
during the summer, together with residential training to develop their
teamworking skills.
Cabinet Secretary Richard Wilson supports the scheme. "The number of
ethnic minority recruits to the fast-stream has doubled over the past couple of
years.
"But we are not complacent about diversity in the Civil Service.
Initiatives like this are crucial if the Civil Service is to reflect the
society it serves," he said.
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Of the top 3,500 jobs in the senior civil service, 2.1 per cent are held by
ethnic minority staff. This has risen from 1.6 per cent in 1998.