IS Councillor Keith Mitchell doing his duty?

Adding to the latest round of immigrant bashing, your article headlined ‘Immigrants need to learn English’, queried the “annual bill” for the county council’s translation costs, obviously implying that ‘immigrants’ (many of whom contribute to the local economy and pay taxes) are an excessive financial burden on the public purse/services.

Your article both misleads and misinforms as it implies issues of ‘nationality’ and ‘ethnicity’, which fall within the ‘protected characteristics’ of ‘race’, are of no consideration. As language and culture are interwoven with, and are integral aspects of, nationality and ethnicity, the county council cannot be negligent in its duty under the Equality Act 2010 to “eliminate unlawful discrimination” in this regard.

Under the new Equality Duty the county council is obliged to ensure no member of public from a “protected characteristic/group” is placed at substantial disadvantage.

Where there is possible disadvantage the council is duty bound to make a reasonable adjustment (eg: ensuring people can access services via translation of information). Of course being a good public servant, Keith Mitchell must be aware of all this.

Unfortunately in his opportunistic attack on people he deems not making enough effort to learn English, he is grossly negligent in the area of the Equality Act 2010 of which in his role as county council leader he should be most mindful: “The duty to foster and promote good relations between persons who share a protected characteristic and those who do not.”

NIGEL CARTER, St Margaret’s Road, Oxford