Campaigners have called on the Government to make Afro hair a protected characteristic to prevent race discrimination in schools and the workplace.
The campaign group World Afro Day (WAD) came to Parliament to convince MPs to amend the 2010 Equality Act to add the specification for Afro hair.
More than 100 public figures, including Mel B, Beverley Knight, Patrick Hutchinson, Fleur East, Evelyn Forde and Professor Patrick Vernon, have signed an open letter to the Government supporting the change.
WAD highlighted that while race is already a protected characteristic, schools and workplaces can still unfairly target people of colour due to their natural hair.
Labour MP for Birmingham Erdington Paulette Hamilton sponsored the drop-in clinic in Parliament on Tuesday and said she has previously felt she would “never succeed in a career” with her natural hair.
She said: “I’d wear wigs, I’d have perms, I’d wear extensions, because that’s what people said I had to do
“I also have four girls, and I wanted to show them that I could be my authentic self and achieve.”
Ms Hamilton said existing legislation does not go far enough to protect people of colour in the workplace, as she urged Labour colleagues to “make a lot of people very happy” by adding to the Equality Act.
She said: “You had employers that, one in three possibly, wouldn’t even employ people if they had their natural hair and that is true discrimination. This is why there is a large group of us out there. It isn’t just a small group, it’s a large group.
“This is why I absolutely believe that we need to change the Equalities Act. We’re amending it at the moment, and I believe it’s an easy win for the Government to change the Equalities Act and actually to include Afro hair as a protected characteristic.
“What they absolutely do is use your hair to not employ you, and then say, ‘oh, it’s not because she was black, it’s because of her hair’, and they can get away with it, and that has to stop.”
WAD founder Michelle De Leon said she had felt under pressure to use chemicals to straighten her natural hair since she was a child.
She said: “When you’re a little black girl or a little brown girl, you kind of look at princesses and the things you see on TV and your friends at school, and you see their hair blowing about, and you have this real kind of hair envy, really, and this kind of feeling that your hair isn’t as nice as everybody else’s hair.”
Ms De Leon said for many people of colour, concerns about how their hair will be perceived are in the front of their mind from the beginning of the employment process.
“I think it starts even before you get to the workplace, like an interview,” she said. “Can I wear my own hair to the interview? Will I be accepted with my own hair? Should I change myself to be accepted?
“So that psychology starts before you even get the job, before you even walk into the office, and then sometimes you kind of choose not to have your own natural hair.
“It’s just part of the fabric of society that straight hair is considered the right type of hair, the most appropriate type of hair, so people sometimes don’t even realise that it’s discrimination to say that hairstyle is not acceptable in our workplace.”
Chi Onwurah, the Labour MP for Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West, also attended the event in Parliament, and said it is important to “promote and recognise the importance of equal treatment for all”, adding “there’s so much ignorance and prejudice about Afro hair”.
WAD member Dhosjan Greenaway-Dalini, who grew up in the British Virgin Islands, said she wanted to raise awareness of Afro hair discrimination and empower the next generation of young black girls to be proud of their natural hair.
She said: “It took me until the age of 40 to be comfortable with the hair the way it grows out of my head, which sounds ridiculous when you think about it, and it’s like, this is what it looks like.
“It’s just freedom to express yourself, I think for me that’s why it’s something I’m really passionate about.
“Now I have a daughter as well, and you know what? Let’s empower each other to be their authentic selves, I think that’s when they’re their best versions.”
