One striking feature of the past year is that neither the City of York Council (CYC) nor civil society organisations framed their responses to the crisis in human rights terms. Yet when issues were framed in this way by the York Human Rights City Network (YHRCN) all parties found it useful. The absence of human rights discourse in the presence of so many human rights concerns demonstrates that delivering on the promise of being a Human Rights City remains work in progress. More positively, the pandemic illustrated the importance of local government, local resilience and local creativity, at a time when national directives were often slow, ineffective or unclear. Cities, including York, became a crucial vehicle for service delivery, activism for change and oversight of policies and performance. This is very much in the spirit of the Human Rights City concept.
The key findings and recommendations of the report are summarised below:
- Equality and non-discrimination emerged as cross-cutting issues, both illuminated and exacerbated by COVID-19 itself and blanket governmental responses. COVID-19 will have long-lasting socio-economic impacts in the city, and as the “shadow pandemics” of poverty, inequality, mental health concerns, isolation and more become increasingly visible, it is vital that our marginalised residents and those in vulnerable situations are not forced to carry the burdens of 2020 for years to come.
- Communications from the CYC about how residents should behave during the pandemic improved from the first to the second wave. Methods of best and most successful practice were identified and utilised. Some problems persisted however, specifically with regard to the digital divide, digital literacy and language of communications. Moving forward, good practices need to be maintained and the remaining problems addressed as a key element of an equality and non- discrimination strategy.
- For the city’s response to leave no-one behind, interviewees repeatedly stressed the importance of co-production and collaboration. Key principles which came to the fore in community responses and which need to inform future action include: neighbourliness, community spirit, resilience, citizen mobilisation, networking and partnership, commitment and agency, creativity and flexibility.
- As human rights was both largely absent as an initial response framework and valued as a belated analytical framework there was strong support from CYC staff and civil society for human rights training. This would equip the city with the tools to utilise a human rights based approach to mitigate the effects of COVID-19 and for building the city back with respect for the human rights and dignity of residents.
- The learning process involved in being a Human Rights City requires looking out as well as looking in. York can continue to benefit from sharing experiences, lessons learnt and best practices relating to COVID-19 and other issues from cities elsewhere, including a new European-led Human Rights Cities Network.
Download: Easy read version of the York Human Rights 5th Indicator Report 2020
Watch: The British Sign Language translation videos for 5th Indicator Report 2020
