The Metropolitan Police are refusing to admit that policing is institutionally racist, despite warnings they will be unable to repair relations with Britain’s black community without doing so.
According to The Times, police leaders have been in high-level talks about making the declaration to demonstrate that they understand and accept that racism is ingrained in the service.
But the Met is reportedly one of several forces opposed to the admission in reforms touted by the National Police Chiefs Council (NPCC). Helen Ball, an assistant commissioner and close ally of Cressida Dick, spoke out against the plan at a meeting this month, reports suggest.
It comes just a week after Dick resigned following yet another scandal, after it emerged that police officers at Charing Cross had joked about killing black children and raping female colleagues. Last year, she denied that the Met was institutionally racist – and said the term was unhelpful.
Bas Javid – a deputy assistant commissioner and the brother of Sajid Javid, the health secretary – told the BBC this week that the Met contained “people who have racist views and are racist”. But, he added, “what I won’t do is describe all the organisation as racist”.
More than 90 per cent of police in England and Wales are white – and less than 1 per cent of promotions last year went to black officers, who are more likely to face harsher disciplinary procedures. Black people are seven times more likely to be stopped and searched than white people, The Times reports.
A bereaved mother this week accused Dick of “smokescreening” to protect the Metropolitan Police “brand” over issues with officers sharing highly disturbing messages on WhatsApp.
Mina Smallman told BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour that the outgoing Met Commissioner had implied that harrowing images shared by officers who were supposed to be guarding the scene of the murder of her daughters, Nicole Smallman and Bibaa Henry, were an isolated issue.
Smallman said: “People thought I was being overly emotional and criticising the police on an isolated incident, but my instincts told me that that just wasn’t the case.
“Now, if you remember, the photographs of our girls were taken in 2020 and Cressida Dick was on record and said ‘If this is true, it’s appalling’. Blah, blah.
“She already knew that there was an investigation going on… started in 2017 about WhatsApp groups. So she would have known that this wasn’t an isolated incident.”
Smallman added: “When this (Charing Cross) report came out, I thought ‘You knew, you knew, and you were all about protecting the brand’.”
Asked if she felt misled by Dick, she said: “I think she was smokescreening.”
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