With the upcoming elections, Britain's Opposition party made their stand clear to the ethnic voters, at a gala diversity night dinner on Wednesday 18 February in London's prestigious Riverside Park Plaza. It was attended by the party leader Rt Hon Ed Miliband, MPs, Peers, PPCs, business and community leaders, professionals- many of who belonged to the BAME community.
The international guest for the evening included Mr Jose Zapatero, the former Prime Minister of Spain.
Present MPs of Asian origin included Keith Vaz, Seema Malhotra, Virendra Sharma, Shabana Mahmood, Sadiq Khan, Rushanara Ali amongst others.
The party took pride in awarding Lord Gulam Noon of St John's Wood KT MBE, a renowned British Indian businessman and entrepreneur, who was the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award 2015. Lord Noon who has founded and operated a number of major food production companies, was elected President of the London Chamber of Commerce and Industry in 2002, and was the first non-white President in 126 years. He is the Chairman of the Noon Foundation which supports a wide range of both national and international causes, including PrincesTrust, CARE International UK. He is also the Chancellor of University of East London.
The evening started with a networking session over drinks and canapés by Madhu's, followed by a sit down dinner. Each table was dedicated to a certain constituency, while volunteers went around, trying to sell raffle tickets.
The band playing had a mix of Indian folk and pop music, adding a diverse angle to the background music.
The event was compered by Brit-Indian actor Nina Wadia, who is best known for playing Zainab Masood in BBC's soap opera EastEnders.
Addressing the audience, Rt Hon Keith Vaz, the party's most prominent Asian MP, for over 25 years said, "We are fielding 45 BAME candidates for the elections on May 7. There are over 99 constituencies in UK where over 25% of voters are from the BAME community. Around 3.3 million of London's population is BAME. Over 300 languages are spoken in schools in London."
“Tonight we are able to celebrate with our leader Ed Miliband, whose personal commitment to diversity is unshakable. We are also delighted to welcome members of the Shadow Cabinet including Yvette Cooper, Chuka Umunna, Sadiq Khan, Gloria DePiero, Mary Creagh and many other BAME MPs. Their attendance is a marker of just how far ethnic minorities have come.
“Next year will mark an important benchmark for ethnic representation in Britain. Already we, the Labour party have selected 30 BAME candidates to stand for Labour at the next election and we still have many more selections to increase this number further. This should be applauded, we are one step closer to making Westminster truly representative of the people they are elected to serve...”
Labour's Prime Ministerial candidate Ed Miliband who proclaimed at Labour's One Nation Diversity dinner on Wednesday night - the last before the 2015 general elections - that he was a son of an immigrant, said, "Our diversity is our strength. Every person in our country is a wealth creator. We are a stronger, richer and a fairer country due to immigration.
“In Britain today, realities are tough for so many people, with wages not rising, and prices going up. We have a plan to turn that around, to build an economy made by the many...
“One Nation Labour is changing to make sure that we always listen to all of Britain. Rooted in every community, on every kind of workplace...”
YouGov survey on last Wednesday put Labour on 34%, narrowly ahead of Conservatives on 33% with Ukip on 15%, the Greens on 7% and Lib Dems on 6%.
Votes from the Indian diaspora are expected to be a major swing factor in the upcoming general election. Almost 4 million voters - about one in 10 of the entire electorate in England and Wales - have been found to be born abroad. Indians are the largest chunk in this foreign born electorate. As many as 615,000 Indians will vote in the upcoming election.
Records show the Commonwealth migrant communities (in particular from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nigeria and South Africa) along with the Irish Republic will have the highest numbers of potential voters in May 2015.
The migrant electorate is heavily concentrated in London - 19 of the 20 seats with the largest migrant voter shares are in Greater London. Migrants would constitute over a third of the electorate in around 25 seats across England and Wales in 2015 and at least a quarter of the electorate in over 50 seats. The migrant electorate could have decisive power in at least 70 seats.
