Oasis CEO apologises to Sikh community for causing offence

John Barneby, the Chief Executive Officer of the Oasis Community Learning Multi Academy Trust has been forced to apologise for offence caused to the Sikh community for including slides about a Sikh youth organisation in slides about religion, extremism and terrorism.

A number of Sikh organisations and members of the community were outraged by the inclusion of an image of Sikh Youth UK alongside that of the Ku Klux Klan and the Taliban and challenged the Oasis Community Learning Multi Academy Trust.

The Chief Executive Officer of the Oasis Community Learning Trust has confirmed in a letter to the Sikh Council UK that the offensive slides have now been removed.

The letter stated: “Oasis Community Learning itself is part of the wider Oasis family, a faith based organisation established almost 40 years ago by Rev Steve Chalke, with a focus on building strong, inclusive communities with equality and opportunity for all. The Oasis RE curriculum is built to enable our students to develop their skills and knowledge to explore different world views (including religious and non religious beliefs and philosophy) and to analyse the big questions in life.

The lesson in question was by no means our student’s first or most significant interaction with the Sikh faith. By the point in key stage three when the lesson was delivered, students had acquired robust knowledge and understanding of the core tenets of the Sikh faith and its inclusive and equally centred theology.”

It went on to say: “The slides which have caused concern were used as part of a broader discussion, facilitated by trained and knowledgeable staff designed to explore how all major religions have varying viewpoints and interpretations.

We understand that without the full context of the lessons and discussions, these could be viewed as inappropriate and so we have removed them.”

Oasis Community Learning Multi Academy Trust is generally held in very high regard and runs 53 academies.

The Sikh Federation (UK) is by far the largest, most prominent and influential campaigning Sikh organisation in the UK that leads on political engagement for the British Sikh community.

The organisation is often referred to as the first and only Sikh political party. The Sikh community in the UK and throughout the diaspora look to the organisation for leadership and direction.

Dabinderjit Singh, the Principal Adviser of the Sikh Federation (UK) said: “It is not enough for the CEO of Oasis to apologise and remove the slides. This targeting of a reputable Sikh organisation and its founder who is pictured in the slides is blatant and should never have taken place.”

Sikh Youth UK and its founder deal with very challenging subjects like bullying and sexual grooming and this sort of misrepresentation makes their job that much more difficult.”

Oasis should immediately write and apologise to Sikh Youth UK and its founder. Showing his image puts him at risk from criminal gangs and could also have serious legal and other consequences for the Trust. This grave misrepresentation by the Trust however needs to be fully investigated as it could be argued Oasis has been spreading racial hatred.”

He added: “They must establish how this was allowed to happen, what due diligence took place and take action against those that allowed this serious mistake to occur so it never happens again. We have written to the CEO today about these matters following the apology and copied Ofsted and the Department for Education.”

Unfortunately, it is mistakes like this that could be incorrectly used by lazy civil servants in weeks to come to falsely label one or two Sikh groups as ‘extremist’ under the government’s new extremist definition.

We will not allow Sikh groups to be falsely labelled extremist for reasons of political correctness as politicians do not want to be seen and accused of picking only on Muslim and right wing groups.”