The TUC Black Workers Conference opens today at a time of heightened debate about a perceived rise in racism. 

I say perceived because many of us have been saying for some considerable time that racism in our lives — whether at work or in the streets — is almost a given.

Of course it’s correct to say that we are seeing much more fascist activity than we have for some years. 

The flames are fanned by politicians at home and abroad who seem to take great delight in blaming all the ills of the world on anyone who is not white or who can’t trace an unbroken Anglo-Saxon ancestry back to some supposed golden era — even when they can’t either. 

The racist behaviours and attacks that are a consequence of these irresponsible but absolutely deliberate tactics have actually been debated pretty much every year since the TUC Black Workers Conference achieved adult status from the mere seminar that it used to be a little over a generation ago.

At the heart of the debates for black workers on how best to challenge racism or fascism has been the role of black self-organisation. 

In essence the right — or not — of black workers to have our own space to develop our political and organising strategies without our voices being filtered or spoken on our behalf. 

It’s also a recognition that we as black workers have our own radical traditions of politics and organising to draw on that respects but isn’t subservient to white European thoughts or experiences.

When I first began my own political organising journey in earnest in the early 1980s I got involved in the Labour Party Black Sections, at first as their trade union organiser and later as national secretary and then chair. 

During that time I got to meet some extraordinary women and men who faced down ridicule for the apparently bare-faced cheek of daring to argue that the Labour Party should recognise an organised black voice throughout its structures and actually elect some black members of Parliament. Incidentally, one of the very first MPs to support this call was a certain Jeremy Corbyn.

Last week one of the pioneers of the ultimately successful movement for black representation in the Labour Party left us to join the ancestors. 

His name was Narendra Makanji. He taught me a lot and was one of my political mentors for more than 30 years. I hope that plenty will be said and written in times to come about the contribution made by this great African-born man of Asian descent but he always reminded me about the transformational power that can come from black self-organisation. 

He also drummed it into me that when your opponent starts to agree with you too readily then you’re probably not pushing hard enough.

Black self-organisation now seems to be everyone’s original idea. Variations on the theme are all the rage. The latest accessory to be marked off the latest diversity to-do list by trendy HR practitioners. 

Black, or rather ethnic minority groups, of every conceivable acronym known to man- and womankind are routinely set up by employers as advisory or focus groups. 

I want it to be clear that I’m absolutely not against any of these groups. Far from it. I welcome anything that brings black workers together to plan and discuss things of common interest. 

Why would I be against them? Under slavery and colonialism these were things that were specifically prohibited after all. 

However, I do remember the sage words of Narendra that maybe we are not pushing hard enough when many of these people who demean, exploit and discriminate against us in the workplace the rest of the time give us a room to sit in with some mango juice and samosas every few months. 

I’m sorry but I just can’t bring myself to get too excited about that.

What I can get excited about is when black workers come together through our trade unions. In Unison, the country’s largest trade union, we recognised the power of self-organisation when we were formed more than a quarter of a century ago. 

So much so that the union enshrined self-organisation and the principle of proportionality for all under-represented groups at all levels of the union.

Black activists who come from the black radical tradition have always argued that it is not black self-organisation, in our unions or anywhere else, just for the sake of it. 

The black self-organisation of which we speak is one that aims to bring about a fundamental and irreversible shift in society in favour of working-class people of which black workers are a part — although you wouldn’t know it when some folks talk of the working class.

We should never feel the need to apologise to anyone for black self-organisation or that we should aim to make white folks feel better about themselves and their white privilege or racism. 

There are plenty of white folks out there who stand shoulder to shoulder with black workers against racism and fascism. 

However, there are others who should know better but have learned nothing except what language or behaviours they might get away with in the presence of black people. 

None of us should have the slightest “tinge” of regret in calling these people out as and when necessary.

Black self-organisation is transformational for us as black workers too. It helps us to lift up our heads and to straighten our backs and to remember who we are and where we came from at a time when it would be easier to keep our heads down. 

That’s fundamentally what the TUC Black Workers Conference does for us every year. It’s a reminder of those who went before us in slavery and colonialism, both periods we were never meant to survive.

The conference will re-energise us for the continuing difficult struggle ahead — a struggle that must recognise the centrality and leadership of black workers in the fight against racism.  

Roger McKenzie is an assistant general secretary of Unison — the public services union.