The kind of diversity that a political party or organisation achieves when it involves people of different sexualities or ethnic backgrounds but without including people with diverse social and professional life experiences.
Many organisations attempt to make themselves representative of the communities or audiences they serve.
The Tories have tried particularly hard to look more like the electorate as a whole - particularly after the media constantly criticised their parliamentary party for being too white and too male. A more diverse cadre of parliamentary candidates was a key cause of the party's modernisers and David Cameron is drawing up a Priority List of 50% men and 50% women.
More women, coloured people and a few more open homosexuals have begun to emerge as Tory candidates for winnable seats. This is certainly one form of diversification but how much does it matter?
What if the new black, female and gay Tory faces are still public school educated barristers, financiers and political apparatchiks? Would they understand modern Britain's challenges anymore than the white males with whom they share City lunches and Ascot?
It is not enough for diversity to be skin deep. Studies of newsrooms have shown that secular, left-wing biases have persisted despite the fact that more women and people of colour have been deliberately and successfully recruited as newsreaders and reporters. A book - Coloring The News - has documented this phenomenon in America.
A more representative Conservative Party should also include many more healthcare professionals, teachers, social entrepreneurs and small business people from urban and northern Britain. It would include some greybeards - people with real experience of life. A Conservative Party that was serious about diversity would also explore ways of helping lower income members to become MPs - perhaps through bursaries. This would equip the Tory Party to talk more confidently of issues, not so associated with its traditional ‘core'. But is anyone monitoring this form of real diversity?
The Conservative Party should never aim for any kind of formulaic diversity - and it obviously shouldn't seek the ideological openness that should characterise the BBC - but it will be strengthened if it provides a home for people of diverse backgrounds and forms of expertise. One of the strengths of the House of Lords is the rich experience of business, the arts, medicine, charity, diplomacy and religion that its members possess.
Evett McAnuff
Evett McAnuff - a black mother of three, social worker and wife of a inner city church pastor – is the kind of candidate that really proves that the Tory Party is achieving deep diversity.
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