Senior Black policing figures have warned of the risk that knee-jerk reactions to outrage over the Henry Nowak case will undo decades of work to rectify long-term institutional racism and declining relations with minority communities.
The murder of the teenager has seen the most acute claims of “two-tier” policing in favour of non-white citizens since the phrase became common in far-right circles. The government and National Police Chiefs Council (NPCC) has announced a review of the wording of the organisation’s anti-racism commitment, which states that ensuring racial equality in policing “does not mean treating everyone ‘the same’ or being ‘colour blind’”.
The wording has been seized on by Nigel Farage of Reform UK, Rupert Lowe of Restore Britain and far-right agitators including Tommy Robinson.
Leroy Logan, the former Met superintendent and founding member of the National Black Police Association (NBPA), said that the reaction to the police failings in Nowak’s murder risked sending policing back to the days before the Macpherson inquiry into the 1993 murder of Black teenager Stephen Lawrence. “We don’t need dog whistle politics adversely impacting UK policing,” he told The Observer, adding: “This form of overreach will end up with a pre-Macpherson police force that’s not fit for purpose for the 21st century in an increasingly multicultural Britain, which the police race action plan was assisting police chiefs with.”
However, former home secretary Jack Straw told the Telegraph last week that he believed there had been an “over-correction” in policing after Lawrence’s murder. Nowak’s murder, in which his killer Vickrum Digwa lied to officers and accused the 18-year-old student of racism, is being investigated by the Independent Office for Police Conduct and one of the officers has already resigned.
Andy George, the current head of the NBPA, said: “My concern is that some of the rhetoric we are now seeing risks undermining years of work to improve trust and confidence between police and communities, particularly at a time when many Black, Asian and minority ethnic officers, staff and communities already feel vulnerable.
“The reality is that racism and disproportionality within policing have not been solved. Despite years of reviews, inquiries and commitments, many of our members still experience policing as a challenging and, at times, hostile environment. We should be wary of using a single tragic case to abandon efforts to address those issues.”
Photograph by Hannah McKay - WPA Pool / Getty Images
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