Statement following the Rudding Park Staff Party on Monday 18 March.
We recognise what happened is not acceptable behaviour and the junior member of staff concerned was immediately asked to remove the make-up by a senior member of staff on the night of the event. We sincerely apologise for any offence caused.
This was a very ill judged and immature action by a 20 year old, who now realises the consequences of his behaviour and regrets the hurt it has caused. He is now undergoing disciplinary procedures.
Rudding Park in no way condones racism and it is not at all acceptable to the company. We employ 24 different nationalities and do not discriminate on racial grounds. It is of the utmost importance to us that everyone is treated equally and with respect and we have spoken with and conducted support discussions with all of our BAME employees (3 are on holiday, but will have the incident discussed with them on their return). We have already scheduled a complete racial bias training programme for all our staff to attend to ensure something like this does not happen again.
I would be delighted to meet and reassure you personally of our sincerity with this issue, so please feel free to contact me on the email below to arrange.
Peter Banks
Managing Director
Peter.banks@ruddingpark.com