Workshops launched to help tackle racism in North Yorkshire
It's being run by a chef who was the target of "horrific" racist attacks
A North Yorkshire woman who experienced "horrific" racism is on mission to improve attitudes and understanding.
Racist attacks and financial pressure meant Maya Mihoc was forced to close her African-Caribbean restaurant in Scarborough earlier this year.
Todays she is launching her cooking workshops to talk about diversity which she is also planning to take into schools later this year.
Maya tells us there is a lot of work to do to change attitudes: "North Yorkshire demographically is majority white. I think we're 98%, particularly Scarborough and I think unfortunately a lot of people, they got away with hate crime because it was not a thing. I think the part that is the saddest out of all of it is the fact that a lot of those behaviours are actually inherited."
"We're hoping that this is going to make a meaningful change. I think, you know, kids are not born racist, they become racist because of the environment and we want to put in the base of educating them about how normal is to migrate, how normal diversity is and actually as an exercise part of our workshop, we're trying to get kids to look into their own heritage. I think the major misconception is, for every single white British person, is that they are purely British."
"The more we're talking to people, the more they're looking for the heritage, talking to their grandparents, their parents, they realise, oh, actually we're from Iberia, we're from Spain, you know, like Swedish West African and it's great to see how kids are so excited and how they can embrace their diversity and they love it."