In its effort to rebuild trust with London’s black community, the Met police have initiated plans to rebuild trust after admitting to “let downs” over several years.
The Race Action Plan will include the resetting of how stop and search is to be carried out in London, designed with the help of black communities.
Met Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley said, “there remains a long way to go and there is a lot more work to do” but added that the Race Action Plan is a step “in the right direction”.
Police can conduct a stop and search if they suspect a person could be carrying a weapon, drugs or stolen property but the tactic has proved controversial, with black people disproportionally more likely to be searched than white people.
The force will also seek to improve how it records and monitors the ethnicity of drivers when making vehicle stops, with external scrutiny for greater transparency.
The plan will also include an overhaul of the Met’s policy on intimate searches of children, to ensure “they only occur when necessary and proportionate”.
Tensions over stop and search have included the treatment of two black athletes, Team GB runner Bianca Williams and her partner, Portuguese sprinter Ricardo Dos Santos.
Two Met constables were sacked in October 2023 following a disciplinary panel finding their actions during a “highly distressing” stop and search amounted to gross misconduct.
Trust in the force was also damaged after a 15-year-old black girl – known as Child Q – was strip searched while on her period at her school in Hackney in 2020.
In a statement, the Met said it wanted to “better represent the communities we serve” and that it would recruit and retain a more diverse workforce.
All new recruits are being trained to understand the experience of black Londoners and other communities across the capital, according to the Met.
Disparities in the Met’s misconduct investigation system is also being tackled, while new workshops to improve promotion rates have helped to raise pass rates for black officers from 68 per cent to 75 per cent since 2021.
Updates on the progress of the plan will be given twice yearly.