Well, well, well. Looks like Michael Howard is attempting to boost the Tories by taking a leaf out the BNP and UKIP’s book.
If the good Doctor were around now, he’d no doubt be telling us that “fighting political correctness” has become the last resort of the scoundrel.
Tories target 'politically correct' policing
Matthew Tempest, political correspondent
Tuesday August 10, 2004
The Guardian
Michael Howard today reopened the row over racism within the police by pledging to scrap the "politically correct" requirement on officers to record the ethnicity of all people stopped on the street.
The Conservative leader made the controversial call in a speech on crime in Middlesbrough aimed at putting "clear blue water" between the Tories and Labour on the issue of law and order in the run-up to next year's likely general election. ... <snip>
He said the police had been undermined by political correctness and would receive backing for "zero tolerance" policing under a Tory government.
More controversially, Home Office plans to give all people stopped by police a receipt detailing their race and why they were stopped would be scrapped in the event of a Tory victory at the next general election, Mr Howard announced.
The receipt scheme was recommended by the Macpherson inquiry into the racist killing of black teenager Stephen Lawrence as a way of discouraging police from using "stop powers" disproportionately against black and Asian people.
It has been piloted in seven areas of the country and is due to go nationwide by April 1 next year.
<snip>
Black people were six times more likely to be stopped and searched by police than whites, the figures
Rest of story:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Politics/conservatives/story/0,9061,1279972,00.htmlThe Skin