The recruitment of the new members was led by the ARC’s Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) working group and is also a practical consequence of the ARC’s new Involvement Strategy, which was co-produced with over 100 local people from a wide range of backgrounds.
The ARC’s aim is to work with groups across the nine protected characteristics covered by the Equality Act 2010: age, disability, gender reassignment, race, religion or belief, sex, sexual orientation, marriage and civil partnership, and pregnancy and maternity. However, we recognise that population health outcomes are much worse for some groups of people – for example, people from Black, Asian and minority ethnic groups and people with disabilities. Therefore, the ARC initially prioritised increasing involvement from these groups.
The new members are:
- Abigail Mensah, Ladies in Waiting Community Interest Group (Board amd Exec)
- Beverley Randall, Mosaic Clubhouse community group (Board and Exec)
- Hameed Khan, Involvement Advisory Group chair (Board and Exec)
- Josephine Ocloo, equity, diversity and inclusion lead, ARC South London and senior researcher, King’s College London (Board and Exec)
- Mariana Pinto da Costa, consultant psychiatrist, South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust (Board and Exec)
- Rashmi Kumar, Involvement Advisory Group member (Board and Exec)
- Sabrina Bajwah, palliative consultant and clinical senior lecturer, King’s College London (Exec)
- Toslima Khatun, researcher, King’s College London. (Exec)