Heres an idea

we wanted to encourage a wider range of people to get involved in residents’ groups and challenge any prejudice residents might have.

I arranged for residents to spend a day with a theatre group that performs interactive plays about discrimination. We got a grant of £3000 from the Community Safety Partnership and joined with Swaythling Housing Society to raise another £3000, which all covered taxis to take people to the theatre, childcare and lunch. We wrote to tenant representatives, the tenants’ forum and people who’d come to an open day or event, and put an advert in our newspaper.

The play involved a mix of characters – a recently bereaved black couple, a guy brought up in care homes, a gay person, an Asian woman, a racist guy and someone with a visual impairment. They all interacted and every issue you can imagine came up. For example, the gay man was a teacher, and some of the characters assumed he must be a paedophile.

After the play, the actors came off stage but stayed in character and the audience could ask them why they behaved in a certain way. Then the audience got to tell the actors what to say when they did another scene.

About 30 tenants of mixed ages came along and they loved it. It gave them the chance to discuss issues people don’t always feel they can mention. Through being more aware of these issues, people can be more sensitive and hopefully that will open the door to minority groups joining in the community and tenant groups.