Page 27 - JUSTICE Tackling Racial Injustice - Children and the Youth Justice System

further evidence after the initial grounds for suspicion were demonstrated to
be unfounded. In light of these issues, the IOPC made 11 recommendations to
the MPS so that it can improve its practice, which the MPS has accepted. We
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consider many of these issues significantly undermine any attempts to build
confidence between the police and the BAME communities they serve. How
stop and search is conducted provides the single most important opportunity to
change the relationship between BAME children and the police. As such, we
support the IOPC recommendations and consider that all police forces
should take steps to implement them.

2.14 Against this already concerning background, there are current proposals to
expand the remit of stop and search powers. The Government has consulted on
the introduction of Serious Violence Reduction Orders (SVRO), which would
allow courts to confer on police the power to stop and search individuals who
have a previous conviction for any relevant offence, such as carrying a knife,
without the need for reasonable suspicion. As highlighted in JUSTICE’s
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response to the Home Office, this new measure could risk significant damage
to community relationships, particularly where BAME individuals would be
treated as “perpetual criminals”. The Working Party agrees, and believes it
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is imperative that the Government consider the disproportionate impact on
BAME communities before expanding police powers in this way.

Damage to community relations

2.15 The opening words to this chapter clearly articulate the detrimental impact that
stop and search has on BAME communities’ confidence in the role of the
police. Many of these incidents are not isolated events, as BAME people
experience being stopped and searched on multiple occasions from childhood

63 Independent Office for Police Conduct, ‘Review identifies eleven opportunities for the Met to improve
on stop and search’, October 2020.
64 Home Office, ‘Serious Violence Reduction Orders: a new court order to target known knife carriers’,
September 2020, p. 2.
65 JUSTICE, ‘Serious Violence Reduction Orders Consultation, Home Office Response’, November
2020, p. 7. See also the Criminal Justice Alliance’s response, which was supported by a focus group
discussion with children and young adults, and includes their views in its appendix - Criminal Justice
Alliance, ‘Serious Violence Reduction Orders Home Office Consultation Response’ November 2020.

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