| AdminHistory | The Co-ordinating Committee Against Racial Discrimination [CCARD] was set up in 1961 by the West Indian Workers Association; Indian Workers Association; and Pakistani Workers Association, in collaboration with the Birmingham University Socialist Union and other groups including the Methodist Mission; Movement for Colonial Freedom and Jewish Ex-Servicemen's Association. A report in 'World News' December 1961 suggests that it was founded at after a meeting in Digbeth called by the West Indian Workers Association and the Indian Youth League to protest the suspected CIA murder of Patrice Lumumba, the leader of the Congolese revolution.
The organisation was established to fight racial intolerance and promote racial harmony, and campaigned to repeal immigration legislation and to introduce laws to outlaw racial discrimination and racial hatred. It demonstrated against the first immigration control bill, which became the 1962 Commonwealth Immigration Act, and took up issues relating to racial discrimination in employment, education and housing, and became involved in individual cases of racial discrimination in Birmingham and Smethwick. Although much of its casework was based in the West Midlands, its focus was nationwide, and it organised a lobby of parliament in December 1965 to protest against the White Paper on Immigration. CCARD worked with the Indian Workers Association on many anti-racist campaigns, and the two organisations worked together on the pamphlet 'The Victims Speak' in 1965. CCARD also had an international scope, and built links with the civil rights movement in America.
Victor Yates, Labour MP for Ladywood, was president/chair of CCARD during the mid 1960s. Founder members included Jagmohan Joshi of the Indian Workers Association and Maurice Ludmer of the Jewish Ex-Servicemen's Association. Jagmohan Joshi was campaign secretary, and when he became committee secretary he was succeeded in the post by Shirley Fossick, who later married Joshi.
CCARD was probably wound down during the late 1960s, but its campaigns were continued by other organisations, including the Indian Workers Association.
Sources: interview with Shirley Joshi, October 2005; 'Racism in the Age of Globalisation' by A. Sivanandan, published on Independent Race and Refugee News Network website http://www.irr.org.uk/2004/october/ha000024.html Accessed August 2006 |