Soul diva Bev joins our anti-racism drive

People spat at my mum in the street because she was black...we have to teach Britain not to hate

She's Britain's Queen of Soul who wowed the crowds on a recent tour with comeback kings Take That. But life hasn't always been as good for singer Beverley Knight. The 34-year-old still bears the scars of racist abuse she suffered as a little girl growing up in Wolverhampton.

The star, who has a string of chart-topping hits and an MBE, is speaking out for the first time about how she and her family were targeted because of the colour of their skin. And she is urging everybody to support the Daily Mirror's Hope Not Hate anti-racism campaign, which was launched yesterday.

Our two-week bus tour across the country aims to celebrate all that is great about Britain. And spread the message - hope not hate...

'I'm the first generation of my family to be born in Britain - my parents were born and raised in Jamaica. Living in Wolverhampton was very diverse and mixed, and most people got along pretty well most of the time. But from a very early age I was aware of hostility towards people like me and my family. Of course, back then I didn't know it was racism, I was too young to understand. It was a dodgy time. The National Front had its headquarters just down the road in Walsall and they did their best to stir up trouble.

'School could be awful at times. I remember being in maths class when I was seven and I was the only black person in the top stream. Other kids would say things like: "Your skin's black because you haven't washed" and "your hair's like a Brillo pad". I did my best to ignore them, but it just got worse. Until one day the teacher went out of the class and this girl starting chanting: "Blackie, blackie." And soon the whole class caught on.

'I got very upset because I felt horribly isolated - I still remember that feeling now. I knew they picked on me because I was black. They were listening to their parents, that's the problem. When I told the teacher she just said: "Oh sit down, you're causing trouble." So I said: "But they're calling me names." And she replied: "Well just call them whities then." I went home and sobbed to my mum and she went straight down there and said this was unacceptable. The next day, in the middle of the lesson, I was removed from the class and sent to the lower stream where there were other black people. That was their way of dealing with it.

'But what happened to me as a child was so trivial in comparison to what my parents suffered. My dad came to Britain in 1959, Mum in 1962. She says it was November, it was freezing and she'd never seen snow before. Once, shortly after my dad arrived in the country, he had to defend himself against a gang of about 20 men. It was Dad and three of his brothers and they were only young.

'Wolverhampton was a different place back then. My mother was spat at, called names and shouted at in the street. People would make excuses not to serve you or let you on to public transport. Buses would drive past or kick you off. I think we have made astonishing progress but we still have a way to go.

'My parents went through hell. Those days may have gone but you still get comments from people. People still say to my mum: "Oh those black people, they're always fighting with knives, they're lazy and they don't want to work." When my mum makes a comment back, they say: "Oh not you! You're different!"

'Some people will ask daft questions and just not realise, like: "Where did you learn to speak English like that?" They're not racist, they're just not engaging their brain. They look at you and see that you're black and think you can't be from here, even though your accent is from Wolverhampton. Some people speak innocently out of ignorance and some people speak with racial intent. Most of the time you can completely see the difference. The race row on Celebrity Big Brother was shocking. I was so disappointed with Jo O'Meara. I had worked with her on Just The Two Of Us, and we had a laugh together.

'Jade Goody is not a clever girl. The reason she got the brunt of the criticism is probably because she was the mouthiest of the lot. She was daft enough to put her mouth into action far too many times. But the comments that cut to the core came from Danielle Lloyd. With Jade, to a certain extent, you have to ignore the ignorant rantings of someone who's not very clever. But Danielle said: "F**k off home." I remember those comments when I was a child, and they still hurt.

'Once in Italy, two of my band members, Carlos and Joe, went into the bank for some money. The woman took one look at these two black guys, one of them pretty big and powerful, and she pushed the panic button. I couldn't believe it.

'Carlos said the next thing he knew he was being hauled out and told to spread against the wall with a gun aimed at him. It was awful for them. Sadly it doesn't surprise me that people can still behave like this. Not everywhere is Britain. As we've seen in very recent cases, Britain isn't perfect, but we're doing a lot better than our European cousins.

'There are far-right parties in other countries that have much more of a foothold than the BNP has here. But we can't be complacent where racism is concerned and, in some parts of the UK, the BNP is on the rise. This has got to stop! I was lucky because my parents taught me to be proud of my heritage and of being British. They would say: "You are a child of Britain, you were born in Wolverhampton, raised in Wolverhampton, and we want you to be proud of that." And I was not the kind of person to cower, ever. I was proud of me and who I was, I always had an inner confidence. But stereotypes are so deeply entrenched and people hold on to them.

People must learn not to hate someone because of where they're from. The reality is that no matter what the colour of your skin, or where you're from, we're all going through the same struggle - just trying to get through life the best we can.'

CATCH OUR CAMPAIGN BUS

Tomorrow the Hope Not Hate bus leaves London for Glasgow on its mission to celebrate modern Britain. Over the next fortnight our red double-decker bus will be coming to you, bringing a message of hope to communities across the country. Our bus will be visiting Trafalgar Square and Piccadilly Circus in London tomorrow afternoon.

And from 10am on Saturday we will be at Dagenham Civic Centre in Rainham Road North. Then at Kilverts Field in Grays, Thurrock, from 12.30am-2.30pm.

By Sunday lunchtime, we'll have reached the Golden Mile in Leicester.

Here's a list of our planned stops...

Fri 23 March: Trafalgar Square, London

Sat 24 March: Dagenham & Thurrock

Sun 25 March: Leicester

Mon 26 March: Nottingham & Lincoln

Tues 27 March: Sheffield

Weds 28 March: Oldham & Manchester

Thurs 29 March: Liverpool & Wrexham

Fri 30 March: Dudley & Birmingham

Sat 31 March: Stoke-on-Trent

Sun 1 April: Sandwell, West Bromwich

Mon 2 April: Blackburn & Burnley

Tues 3 April: Keighley, Bradford & Batley

Weds 4 April: Leeds

Thurs 5 April: Sunderland & Newcastle

Fri 6 April: Glasgow

Mirror