RIGHTS campaign groups Liberty, Runnymede, Stonewall and INQUEST have responded to Baroness Casey’s review of the Metropolitan Police Service which was produced last week.
They wrote: ‘Baroness Casey’s scathing report yet again evidences the deep-seated culture of institutionalised racism, misogyny and homophobia which runs through the Metropolitan Police Force.
‘This is not new information, our communities have been victims to it for decades. It continues to put women and minoritised people at risk every day.
‘Like Macpherson 24 years ago, Casey’s report identifies the same issues and reaches the same conclusions, that the Metropolitan Police Force is institutionally violent and discriminatory.
‘And despite ongoing and unresolved concerns about the use of the police’s existing powers, our government continues to grant them more.
‘A swathe of deeply regressive pieces of legislation, introduced in the last two years, together give police broader, more discretionary powers and increased access to tasers, whilst rolling back protections for people to defend their rights.
‘Concurrently, the Shadow Cabinet is promising to be “the party of law and order”, pledging to increase police and community support officers.
‘We all deserve to feel safe in our communities. Community policing requires trust first, as a precondition, in order to be successful.
‘Increasing powers and the presence of an extremely problematic institution including the public’s inability to trust it, without addressing its fundamental issues, is clearly not the solution.
‘We reject any expansion of the scope of the Metropolitan Police Force, including frontline or increased neighbourhood policing, in the current context.
‘We recall in recent memory the murder of Sarah Everard by a Met officer; the deaths of Chris Kaba and Oladeji Omishore following contact with Met officers; the grotesque treatment of Nicole Smallman and Bibaa Henry by Met officers; Child Q and the hundreds of children strip searched by Met officers; the way in which groups of Met officers have been exposed demeaning their LGBTQ+, Muslim and Jewish colleagues, while “joking” about raping female colleagues, killing black children and beating spouses.
‘The UK has a long tradition of “policing by consent”.
‘However it is increasingly clear that our communities do not consent to the violent, predatory and discriminatory policing that we are currently offered.
‘The culture and standards of policing are inextricably linked to the powers they hold.
‘Minoritised communities have repeatedly borne the brunt of these grave misuses of police powers for generations.
‘If we are to seriously reckon with the findings of Baroness Casey’s report, we have to start with the powers the police hold.
‘We stand united in our call for the roll back of the policing powers of the Metropolitan Police Force.
‘Years of austerity have ravaged our public services and support systems.
‘Rather than continue to increase the power and presence of a broken institution, including in our children’s schools, we call for significant and sustained investment into community-based solutions which tackle the root causes of crime; eradicating poverty, access to good education, housing and health care and the equality of opportunity for all.
‘If the government seriously wants to keep communities safe, they must action the non-expansive recommendations outlined in Casey’s report, roll back police powers, and invest in community-led systems for justice and accountability.’
Jodie Beck, Policy and Campaigns Officer at Liberty, also issued a separate statement, saying: ‘The Casey Report adds to the endless pile of evidence showing that institutionalised racism, misogyny and homophobia runs through British policing.
‘We all want to feel safe in our communities, but today’s report once again shows that this is often not the case for so many people – including women and marginalised communities.
‘It’s shocking that even as more and more horrific stories are breaking about the conduct of serving officers, far from stripping away the powers that make these abuses possible, the government continues to hand even greater powers to the police.
‘It’s deeply concerning that the current political thinking across the board appears to prioritise increased police powers, when we know that the powers of the police are so broad that they will always be open to abuse.
‘While we welcome the acknowledgement that the Met is institutionally racist, misogynistic and homophobic, we’ve seen report after report and still nothing changes. Reform is not enough.
‘Instead, we must have meaningful discussions about how we can better keep communities safe, and prioritise solutions which have human rights and social justice at their hearts.’
- The Tory Public Order Bill is currently in its final stages on its passage through Parliament.
The bill’s provisions include adjustments to public order, police functions, and protest-related activities legislation.
It also includes new ‘suspicionless’ stop and search powers to allow the police to stop and search where they suspect anyone may be carrying equipment that might assist in an illegal protest.
The proposed Section 10, ‘powers to stop and search without suspicion’, cover the circumstances in which ‘a police officer of or above the rank of inspector’ can authorise stop and search.
The provisions would allow the police to search people who individually may not be under suspicion, but are in an area where the police think an illegal protest or gathering has been planned.
For example, if police heard of an event to block a motorway, they could stop and search all the individuals in cars in the vicinity of the motorway.
The police would not need to articulate and account for their suspicion of each person individually.
Protections against random stop and searches include the specificity of the geographical area in which they can be applied, the seniority of the rank authorising them, and the retention of the power for a maximum of 24 hours.
Most of the circumstances in the bill are very specific: road blocks, tunnelling, and ‘locking on’, for example.
Although these activities might curtail the right to protest, and we might have concerns about how the police will use their powers, these examples do not lend themselves to racially motivated policing.
However, they are not exclusive, and the risk of racial profiling and discrimination comes from extending stop and search to all sorts of activities, none of which need be related to protest or climate change.
It is unlikely that once the powers are in place, they will be used solely for those actions listed in the bill or accompanying notes.
In addition to the examples given above is the inclusion of the catch-all category ‘an offence under Section 78 of the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022’, which refers to intentionally or recklessly causing public nuisance.
This section criminalises ‘obstructing the public or a section of the public in the exercise or enjoyment of a right that may be exercised or enjoyed by the public at large’.
This would enable the police to stop and search anyone in any gathering who was ‘reckless’ as to the impact a group might have on the enjoyment of others.
This could easily include parties, raves, street gatherings, or protests. The proposed powers do require a police officer at inspector level to authorise searching in the area in question, but this is a very low level of decision making.
Stop and search powers require ‘reasonable grounds’ to suspect the person is carrying drugs, weapons, stolen property, or tools for committing crimes (for example, a crowbar). It is primarily used for drugs and weapons. The new provisions would extend the list to any ‘equipment’ that could be used for any sort of protest or disturbance.
Home Office-commissioned research by Tiratelli, Quinton and Bradford in 2018 showed that stop and search neither prevented nor deterred knife or drug crime.
Its disproportionate use against black people impacted badly on race relations, and resistance to its unfair application often led to criminal charges and greater loss of respect for the law. The greater the use of stop and search, the lower its arrest rate.
The police inspectorate has consistently criticised stop and search practices, including in 2015 when they found that 15% of searches were illegal, a higher rate of illegal activity amongst the police officers carrying out the searches than that of those searched – just 7%.
