Stop and Search - Marginalising communities one ‘stop’ at a time
The law conferring powers on law enforcement agencies to authorise the invasive stop and search procedure has consistently received criticism for its disproportionate application. The rationale behind the mechanism is rooted in efforts to maximise crime prevention on the ground, however, the lack of arrests resulting from these searches gives rise to accountability issues. As inherent in street policing, low levels of visibility allow for officers to utilise the ambiguity of Section 60 searches (under the Criminal Justice and Public order Act 1994) in an authoritarian manner, driving a wedge between the community and its supposed representatives. Specifically, the arbitrary nature of the statute is exemplified in clauses like Subsection 1(b), whereby the choice to search can be made according to an inspector’s personal whim that an offensive weapon is being carried, ‘without good reason’. It is this freedom conferred upon authority figures which allow for interference from bias and stereotypes to govern their behaviour instead of a provision that should ensure an equal application of justice.
Where a requirement for ‘reasonable suspicion’ remains absent, the sustained use of self-generated searches which fall short of arrest amplifies the ‘us’ and ‘them’ culture between the police and those subject to their scrutiny. This culture exhibited by current statutory instruments calls for urgent reformation if the law is to be respected by society as a whole.
In the year ending March 2020, Her Majesty’s Inspectorate reported that Black individuals were 18 times more likely to be searched than their White counterparts under section 60. Police remain unable to provide an adequate explanation for this astoundingly disproportionate use of their power, disrupting the lives of BAME individuals who evidently suffer in their everyday lives as their liberty is perpetually subject to a steadfast restriction. HM Inspector of Constabulary, Wendy Williams, has herself outlined that this inexplicable imbalance ‘feeds perceptions among the public and police about Black people and crime, and may also influence how the police allocate and deploy resources.’. Essentially, these perceptions lead to the law acting as a counterproductive device for preventing crime, as it causes distrust amongst officers whose duty it is to protect the community rather than demonise it.
In response to a recognition that no-suspicion searches could be legally incompatible with human rights legislation, Theresa May introduced the Best Use of Stop and Search (BUSS) Scheme in 2014. The scheme aimed to provide comprehensive guidance surrounding how to improve police accountability through a reformed complaints procedure, increased levels of data recording, and legislative adjustments. In relation to Section 60 searches, May heightened the ranking required by an officer for its authorisation and the necessity for a reasonable suspicion that violence ‘will’ take place rather than ‘may’ do. Theresa May acknowledged that ‘nobody wins when stop and search are misapplied… it is unfair, especially for black men. It is bad for public confidence in the police’, and her ambitions led to the scheme being truly successful. Notwithstanding the statistical evidence that no-suspicion searches reduced from 2013/14 to 2017/18 by 36%, this apparent stride towards equality is currently in jeopardy.
A reformation surrounding the way in which policing is approached has been a long-standing discussion amongst members of Parliament, particularly where institutional racism has been experienced by those with a voice in the House of Commons. Consequently, an attempt was made to give those without a voice, an opportunity to be heard in 2020, when Dawn Butler, Labour MP for Brent Central, filmed her dehumanising search in the London Borough of Hackney. She was stopped due to a system ‘error’, ultimately calling for action to be taken as ‘we cannot continue to rely on a system that targets BAME communities. Yet this encounter combined with BUSS guidance has clearly not stopped those with greater legislative abilities from sweeping the issue of racial discrimination under the rug
The current Home Secretary, Ms Priti Patel, announced in July last year that the safeguards in place designed to limit discrimination under BUSS would be scrapped. Yet this announcement did not go without reproval, as rights groups Liberty and StopWatch have threatened to take legal action against the decision due to its unlawful justification. The Home Secretary’s decision exemplified the governmental indifference to institutional racism, particularly where racial bias has been proven to influence searches despite the existing safeguards. Under these newly proposed rules, searches under Section 60 could be authorised by a lower-ranking officer, increasing the opportunity for personal bias to interfere with the larger responsibility of achieving justice.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, the power to stop and search was majorly abused during the lockdown, particularly in London where a 40% increase in searches was present. Due to reduced reports of crime in times of lockdown, police officers’ work became more proactive in responses to crime as they perceived it to be. The then commissioner of the Metropolitan Police Service, Dame Cressida Dick, told the Home Affairs Select Committee that just over 20,000 searches of young black men were carried out from March to May 2021, equating to more than a quarter of 15-24 Black males in the capital. The increased use of Section 60 powers allowed for a sustained absence of ‘reasonable grounds’ to prevail during lockdown, as the self-generated nature of searches meant that 80% of the searches resulted in no further arrest. These extraordinary powers are exemplified to be a waste of police time an inefficient way of fulfilling the aim of crime prevention, as illustrated by the Director of Liberty, Martha Spurrier, ‘its long past time to scrap Section 60 stop and search and take meaningful action on discrimination in British policing’.
Stop and search has fundamentally been deemed ineffective, specifically in reference to Section 60, which has simply allowed for innocent individuals to be marginalised one ‘stop’ at a time.
