§ Mr. Proctorasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will make a statement on the letter sent by his Department to chief constables urging positive discrimination in favour of members of the ethnic minorities wanting to join the police.
§ Mr. RaisonThe Select Committee on Home Affairs recommended that vigorous steps should be taken to recruit ethnic minority police officers and Lord Scarman recommended that an urgent study should be conducted of ways in which this might be done. The study group set up by the Department expects to complete its work during the summer. Meanwhile, as most police forces outside London are at or near full strength, we are anxious that good quality candidates from the ethnic minorities should not be turned away solely because there are no vacancies. The Association of Chief Police Officers was informed in March that we should be prepared to consider requests from police authorities to hold supernumerary ethnic 221W minority recruits to whom an early appointment could not otherwise be offered. So far, no such request has been received. This arrangement is similar to that for former police cadets.