Creative Diversity Network (CDN) has published its latest report, Diamond: The seven point five cut, analysing data gathered through the Diamond diversity monitoring system, measuring diversity on and off-screen in UK television during the period from August 2023 to December 2024.
It’s encouraging that representation among disabled writers is increasing, from 3.5% in 2022/23 to 7.5% in 2023/24, but we caution that this is still significantly below workforce figures of 20%.
For women writers there has also been a slight increase – from 36.9% in 2022/23 to 41.3% in 2023/24, but again this is still below the 48.7% workforce figure.
We welcome the fact that Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic writers made up 25.1% of contributions in 2023/24, up from 13.2% in 2022/23, and that this is above workforce estimates of 17%.
There has however been a dramatic reduction in LGB writing contributions, down from 28.6% in 2022/23 to 15% in 2023/24, which is a concerning development, and one we will be keeping a close eye on.
Project Diamond reports separately on the work of transgender contributors but has not provided specific figures for transgender writers. Writers are included as a ‘senior’ role, along with directors, producers and others. The number of contributions from those in senior roles have stayed the same – at 0.3% in 2022/23 and 2023/24. This is disappointingly still lower than workforce figures of 0.5%.
As we have outlined in our manifesto Putting writers at the heart of the story, we are calling for mandatory equalities monitoring and reporting on creative freelancers, plus independent inquiries into racism, sexism and other forms of discrimination in the creative industries.
We continue to hold regular member networks for under-represented writers – you can find out more and sign up for a network here.
Members who are facing racism, sexism and other forms of discrimination in the course of their work can contact our casework team in confidence for support and advice: casework@writersguild.org.uk
Read Diamond: The seven point five cut report here.