National LGBT+ Police Conference 2019

In 2019, the annual LGBT+ Police conference took place in the Capital City of Wales, Cardiff on Friday 23rd August. This was the first time the event has been hosted in Wales by the four Welsh forces.

The event theme of ‘Changing Workplaces Together, Creating Harmony’ or CWTCH for short, involved an action packed agenda focused on wellbeing and mental health in the workplace. In addition to updates from the Network Chairs and DCC Julie Cooke, 350 delegates attended talks and workshops on topics such as:

• Equality Monitoring – Why is it important and how can we best collect and use this data? Why do people choose to ‘prefer not to say’?
• Mental Health within LGBT+ Policing – A study by Mind UK
• ‘Minority within a minority’ – How can we ensure our Bi and Trans members individual needs and issues are addressed
• Challenging Perceptions – How do our biases affect those around us and what can we do to be more mindful

At 11am, we held a two minute silence to honour our colleague, PC Andrew Harper who sadly died in the execution of his duties whilst working with Thames Valley Police.

We also heard personal experiences and awarded the annual Julie Barnes-Frank award before ending the day with a panel discussion and the creation of pledges that delegates would use to take their learning back and implement in their workplaces. The learning and feedback from the conference can be found in the Members Resources area.

Over 200 officers and staff then took part in the weekend long Pride Cymru event which began with a uniformed parade through Cardiff, a fantastic event that was enjoyed by all.