02 Sep 2024

Two railway colleagues who realised they were the first all female and all Black traincrew to operate a Transport for Wales train have urged people of all backgrounds to join the railway.

Train driver Jamilla Fletcher and Train Manager Danielle Adams have said the found the company very welcoming and full of “fantastic opportunities”.

“I’ve felt really proud working here and what I’ve achieved,” said Danielle, from Cardiff.

“When I joined it was on the catering team but I worked hard and became a train manager.

“I was used to working in the transport industry so I did have an idea what to expect in terms of shift patterns and I have to say the training I received was really thorough.”

While both work mainline services, rostering and shift patterns mean that it can be unpredictable which driver will be paired with which Train Manager on any given shift, so it was only when the pair got talking on arrival into Cheltenham Spa where their service turned round that they realised.

Incredibly both Jamilla and Danielle both worked as cabin crew before joining the railway, with both having stints with Virgin and EasyJet. They also both spent time working for the NHS but didn’t meet until they joined Transport for Wales.

“It was incredible just how similar our career paths had been,” added Jamilla, who initially joined TfW as a dispatcher at Newport.

“We’d never met before but now we’re really good friends.

“When we worked together it wasn’t a conscious thing to think we were the first black female train crew, but we put the picture up internally and the reaction we had was fantastic.

“You do have to go into it with your eyes open in terms of the shift work, but I think it is a fantastic job and it would be amazing to see more people from different backgrounds and especially more women coming forward to apply.”

Earlier this year Transport for Wales Chief Executive Officer James Price signed the Zero Racism Wales pledge as part of Transport for Wales' commitment to support the anti-racist pledge 

Mr Price said: “Transport for Wales should represent the communities we serve. When it comes to racial diversity, we’re currently falling far short of where we should be.

“Just 1.2% of TfW’s workforce are people from minority ethnic backgrounds. Among the Welsh general population, that figure stands at 9.4%.

“To improve, we’ve met with and learnt from other public sector organisations, community groups, academics and colleagues. Their honest feedback has been invaluable. I thank them for it. We hope this plan assuages their concerns and gives them faith in our intent to make tangible and effective changes.”

To improve diversity through recruitment, we have:

• Provide career options to all through advertising, outreach initiatives and spotlighting role models to target underrepresented groups.

• Build relationships with multicultural organisations such as Diverse Cymru, Oasis and the Muslim Council of Wales.

• Work with schools to get a higher uptake of apprenticeship opportunities from ethnic minority communities by being proactive with outreach and community engagement.

• Provide mandatory Hiring Manager training to ensure individuals involved in recruitment are aware and act on their bias.

• Review our Pathways Programmes to ensure they continue to provide support to underrepresented communities.

• Identify any retention issues of colleagues from ethnic minority communities by ensuring a robust exit interview process is in place to enable us to analyse trends.

• Develop a suite of activities designed to build employability skills for young people from underrepresented backgrounds.

• Increase the diversity of our senior colleagues including membership of our Board.

For more information about the opportunities available at TrC visit our website