Last month, I was invited by my friend Danny Lee  Wynter to an event he had organised at the National Theatre called Act for Change. It’s a movement that was set up in response to a TV Advert in 2014 which trailed the upcoming season of TV but failed to feature a single BAME performer or disabled artist. AfC campaigns on a platform that the arts are for everyone, regardless of race, gender, class, sexual orientation, age or disability, and they should reflect the societies we live in. Sound familiar to problems in any other places of work?

The event at the National was wonderful, eye opening and angry all in different measures. Chaired by Shami Chakrabati with a host of interesting voices on the panel including the actor Adrian Lester who told a wonderful story about his daughter commenting on the lack of diversity among Hobbits whilst they watched together the Lord of the Rings trilogy. He tried to reason with her until she pointed out an exact passage in Tolkein’s books in which the hobbits are described as being dark skinned which had just been ignored in the casting process.

I think Phyllida Lloyd summed the situation up best in the event when she answered a question by saying:

I don’t think there’s any big conspiracy to keep older women off the stage – I just don’t think the straight, white, middle aged men who run our theatre companies miss us when we’re not there.

The National seemed an appropriate place to have this meeting as although Rufus Norris, the new artistic director, is absolutely making the right noises about diversity – he still doesn’t have a single BAME associate on his team. For a company who are publically funded to represent the voices of our nation, that’s quite a staggering fact. It’s not just the National, though – between all of London’s theatres, there’s only 5 BAME associates between them. It’s almost like being the party championing diversity with only 8 male, white, straight MP’s.

It’s come to mind in several hustings in the last month when I’ve heard Tim Farron suggest that if his diary for the next day was made up of meeting 10 people who looked and sounded like him, then he should ‘bloomin well rip the diary up and start again.’ Quite.

I think both in the Arts, in politics and indeed in most areas of life the danger of not knowing what you don’t know will always be there unless you actively seek every day, indeed in every decision, to actively seek out diversity. It’s not good enough to suggest that not enough people are into politics or aren’t performing as well as they could – it’s up to those of us who are involved to inspire and empower others into taking action. And to actively seek out difference.

Guardian reviewer Matt Trueman, a colleague and friend who I’ve worked with nearly a decade ago when diversity was even worse in the Arts, suggests in an article that the solution is simple:

The thing is, this particular issue is very easily solvable – even if it doesn’t immediately solve the overall lack of diversity. These are pro-rata (in some cases unpaid) positions and there’s no limit on the number of associates a theatre might have on its staff. Nor is there any need to circumvent employment or make staff redundant to level the situation out. It’s simply a matter of making an appointment or two. We could have proportional representation at associate level by the end of the summer. There’s really no excuse.

The baton is well and truly down for the Arts and I look forward in London particular to working as best I can to keep pushing the issue on to the agenda. The smart and socially just thing for politics and in particular our party is to lead the way first.

* Zack Polanski is a Liberal Democrat member in Holborn and St Pancras