The Metropolis

The Met's stop and search webchat digested

Mike Pollitt | Wednesday 1 February, 2012 13:14

This lunchtime Met Police Commander Tony Eastaugh held a live webchat answering questions on stop and search. As with Bernard Hogan-Howe’s Twitter debut before Christmas, the Met chose which questions to answer and there were no tricky follow ups. But as with that Twitter debut, more accountability can only be a good thing even if it’s stage managed.

Here are some of the key exchanges.

Q: How can police be tougher on gangs when one of their most valuable tools is being pretty much taken away?

A: The Met is very much focusing on tackling gangs…none of our stop and search powers are being taken away or reduced, we just want to use them in a more effective and focused way, specifically in relation to violent people who plague our communities.

So S&S is here to stay but targeted on the violent plague rather than the innocent bystanders. But is this distinction quite so clear in practice?

Q: Why are black people four times more likely to be stopped than white? Does this mean that the Metropolitan police are racist and discriminatory?

A: I fully appreciate that there are concerns around this issue and we are working with community groups to understand the reasons for this more deeply.

This stock answer tells us absolutely nothing.

Q: How do you justify ‘stop and search’ when many people find it demeaning?

A: Most people in London want us to do stop and search and surveys have shown [this]. We train our officers to use their powers with respect and sensitivity. If they do not we expect them to be held to account.

Is “most people want us to do it” a good justification for doing something?

Q: What are you doing to educate / supervise police officers into treating S&S subjects with respect esp. if nothing found?

A: Part of our new approach is to really focus and revise our training for front line police officers. The details of this will be published on our website as part of our open approach to being held to account.

Good answer.

Q: This policy was noted as a major factor in anti-police sentiment contributing to 2010 Tottenham riots

A: We will always have the ability to impose section 60s in response to violence, however we also want to increase the intelligence threshold which we use to initiate such a power. The reason for this is that we fully believe that if you are stopped and searched you should be entitled to a proper explanation of the grounds and reasons for that search – section 60 does not always give you the full reasons why you’ve been stopped.

This answer suggests fewer section 60 orders will be issued in future. These orders allow people to be stopped without a reason being given, and are reserved for exceptional circumstances, basically when violence is roaming abroad like it was during the riots. What the answer does not do is address the underlying resentment against the police caused by routine stop and search in the weeks/months/years before the riots kicked off. It looks like the Met are signaling a small change in their attitude to routine S&S, but whether that will be noticeable on the ground remains to be seen.

Met Police – Live stop and search webchat
Snipe – Bernard Hogan-Howe’s Twitter debut digested

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