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         <p><a href="http://www.theguardian.com/culture/lenny-henry" title="More from the Guardian on Lenny Henry" target='_blank'>Lenny Henry</a>
has urged broadcasters to take immediate action to reverse the fall in
the number of black and Asian people in the creative industries in a set
of proposals dubbed the "Henry plan".</p><p>The actor and comedian
called on broadcasters to ringfence money to increase the number of
black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) people both on screen and behind
the scenes at a diversity summit for the UK creative industries chaired
by the culture minister Ed Vaizey on Wednesday.</p><p>He said
"structural change" was required and called on the industry to echo the
regional diversity model adopted by the BBC to increase TV production
outside of London.</p><p>Vaizey indicated that the government would look
to make broadcasters more accountable over the number of black and
Asian people they employed, admitting that the issue required "more
teeth".</p><p>The writer and broadcaster Trevor Phillips, who was among
about 30 people who attended the two-hour meeting in London, said: "We
don't have accountability at the moment and one of the reasons for that
is if you look at the boards of the key broadcasters, the BBC, ITV,
Channel 4, BSkyB, and [the media regulator] Ofcom, there are 62 people
who sit on these boards and all but one of them are white.</p><p>"I'm
not blaming them, but frankly you are not going to get out of that mix
much interest or knowledge in the question of diversity. These are the
people who hire and fire bosses. They set the tone."</p><p>Phillips
called for a reporting system that would make public the "on-screen mix"
of broadcasters and the representation of minority ethic groups in the
same way that overnight TV ratings are published. "Once different
channels can see what other companies are doing, they will do something
about it," he said.</p><p>Henry, a long-time campaigner to improve
diversity on television, last year criticised Bafta for not doing more
to celebrate black people on the small screen.</p><p>As well as
ringfencing money for BAME companies, Henry said the government could
explore tax breaks for BAME productions and use an apprenticeship scheme
to get more black and Asian people into the industry.</p><p>The actor
Kwame Kwei-Armah, best known for playing the paramedic Finlay Newton in
BBC1's Casualty, who was also at the diversity meeting with Vaizey, told
<a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03q9q2q" title="" target='_blank'>Radio 4's The Media Show</a> that black and Asian actors were being "pushed to go to America because they have a glass ceiling" in the UK.</p><p>"There
are not enough roles for them [in the UK]. Creatives are also seeing
America as a wonderful outlet … in Britain it is not," he added.</p><p>"My
biggest fear is my children and grandchildren will be having this
debate in 20, 40 years time in the same way I was 25 years ago and
that's a crying shame."</p><p>Other people who attended the meeting
included the BBC's director of television, Danny Cohen, the BSkyB
managing director for content, Sophie Turner Laing, the former Channel 4
chief diversity officer Oona King and the presenter and campaigner
Floella Benjamin.</p><p>The former BBC chief creative officer Pat
Younge, another attendee, also spoke to The Media Show afterwards. "The
broad consensus was there has been progress, but it hasn't been fast
enough and it seems to be slowing down," Younge said.</p><p>"The
critical question is accountability. Ed Vaizey was very clear about
that. One role he said he could play was holding people to account," he
added. "He recognised there were all sorts of fancy commitments by
broadcasters produced over time, yet no one has held them to account for
delivery, and the consequences of non-delivery."</p><p>Younge said
there was a lack of ethnic diversity among commissioning executives,
whom he described as "almost entirely white", who might go on to more
senior jobs such as channel controller. "To get one at the top [in
broadcasting] you need 20 in the level beneath. We have had twos and
threes."</p><p>The former ITV News chief executive Clive Jones, one of
the founders of the TV industry's Cultural Diversity Network in 2000,
said its efforts to improve BAME representation in the sector had
"worked initially" but "gone seriously backwards" in recent years
because it was no longer seen as a priority by management.</p><p>Jones
said there had to be clear targets for broadcasters enforced by
regulators such as Ofcom and the BBC Trust relating to casting, training
and employment.</p>
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