Jennifer Nicol comments on the row over Diane Abbott's tweet
Friday 6 January, 2012
Diane Abbott, Britain's first black female MP, has become caught up in a row following a remark she made about white people on Twitter. The comment was made by her during a conversation about Stephen Lawrence's murderers. She was ordered by Ed Milliband to apologise after she tweeted: "White people love playing divide and rule. We should not play their game." Ms Abbott, who is a well known campaigner on race diversity issues, said that her remarks were taken out of context and that context was difficult to create within the 140-character limit permitted for a Tweet.
Jennifer Nicol, a partner in our City office said: "This is a classic example of making generalisations based on race. Such generalisations may well be regarded as racist whether they are made by a white person about black people or a black person about white people. The row also demonstrates the dangers of making unguarded comments on social networking sites such as Twitter. The immediacy of communications on social networking sites can result in people getting caught up in the moment and not taking the care they would usually take when using more conventional methods of communication. This, coupled with the fact that the communications are readily accessible to a large section of the population, means that there is no escaping the consequences of unwise comments. In addition, for Twitter users the limit on the number of characters can, (if one accepts what Ms Abbott claims), make it difficult to ensure that comments are read in the right context."
For employers, this episode reinforces the need to have a carefully thought out social media policy in place regulating the use of social media both inside and outside of work, together with appropriate provisions for taking disciplinary action against employees who fail to comply. Recent cases have demonstrated that employers who have such policies in place will be able to dismiss employees fairly if the policy is breached.
Regular training on diversity issues is also key.
