Watch the forum

The first to resign was Pc Robert Pulling of North Wales Police, who was shown dressed in an improvised Ku Klux Klan hood and making a string of racist comments.

Home Secretary David Blunkett said the racism was "horrendous" and urged better training for recruits.

The Police Superintendents' Association of England and Wales called upon chief constables across the country to uncover any serving racist officers and dismiss them.

Are the police institutionally racist? What can be done to tackle racism in the forces? Can trust in the police be restored?

TRANSCRIPT:

Newshost:
Hello and welcome to this BBC interactive forum with me Daniel Sandford. Today we're talking about racial prejudice within the ranks of Britain's police. After a BBC TV programme exposed racism amongst young police recruits how big a problem is it? And what can be done to stamp it out? The Secret Policeman showed eight officers, seven of them trainees, expressing pretty extreme racist views.

Well I'm joined now from Sheffield by Chief Superintendent Rick Naylor, the president-elect of the Police Superintendents' Association for England and Wales.

Good afternoon Chief Superintendent. It was a fairly depressing programme wasn't it.

Rick Naylor:
Good afternoon Daniel. It was indeed a very, very depressing programme and I said on BBC Radio, immediately after the programme, how depressed I was and how upset I was to hear all the views that were expressed in that programme, it was appalling.

Newshost:
Well look we'll get straight on to the e-mails that have been coming in. Starting with Fred Kimpton from Bodmin and he says: The officers in question claimed they were expressing views generally held by their colleagues, does this mean if the police force does kick out the racists in its ranks that there won't be any police officers left?

Rick Naylor:
Well it's understandable that Fred got that view from the programme and it's easy for me to reassure him to say that no those views are not widely held by members of the police service up and down the country. Indeed the police service has gone through a lot of change since the Stephen Lawrence report and we've taken it very, very seriously indeed, the issue of racism. And we go through a lot of training, a lot of attitudinal training to make sure that we keep this problem as small as possible. It was just so disappointing the other night on television to hear these new recruits espouse these disgusting views.

Newshost:
Yes and of course it was worth emphasising that there are 120 or so recruits on the course and he only managed to find seven expressing these views but I think quite a lot. Dave from Sheffield says: If the BBC hadn't undertaken the investigation which they did how would we have realised the extent of racism in the police force? Did you realise the problem was so big?

Rick Naylor:
I think we've known that there's been a problem in the police service for some time and the Stephen Lawrence report showed us that. We were under the impression that we'd been working very hard to eradicate it. What The Secret Policeman's programme showed us was that we need to do more and we need to do more at a very early stage. Very, very difficult to screen people coming into the police service or any other service about their views and attitudes. But what is important is when they do surface, as they surfaced during this programme, that we take effective and quick action to make sure that these people are no longer in the police service.

Newshost:
The next question I suppose gets to the heart of all this, it's a guy called Bav from Northwood in Middlesex, he says: How do you expect people who aren't white to ever trust and cooperate with police forces again?

Rick Naylor:
It's very, very difficult after they've seen that programme and I know that all I'm speaking today is words, what people in the ethnic minorities will believe is behaviour and we need to make sure that the police behave in a fair manner to everybody in society, doesn't matter what colour their skin is. And I'm sure that there are countless thousands of police officers up and down the country doing exactly that, day in and day out. This is a very, very small minority but it's a very, very destructive minority and we need to take - as I said before - effective quick action to make sure that they're outed out of the police service and I'm very pleased that the majority of those that we saw on television the other night are no longer police officers.

Newshost:
Indeed many, many of them have resigned - I think five it is in total. Now I suppose the next question gets to the heart of - I mean what that programme was showing was recruits and Jan from Ealing in London says: Why don't new recruits undergo psychological profiling to root out this sort of prejudice and intolerance?

Rick Naylor:
Well people joining the police service go through a whole raft of tests both physical and aptitudinal tests to make sure that they're suited to be police officers. It is very difficult to actually get to the root core of individuals' beliefs but clearly it's something that we've got to look at, to see if there is anything that we can put in that process - in the recruiting process - to make sure that we don't get people like this coming in the service and I think that is extremely important work that has to be done.

Newshost:
And certainly I know the Home Office have been talking about trying to spread out this pilot programme at the moment where there are some tests going on at the recruitment stage - that's right isn't it?

Rick Naylor:
Yeah.

Newshost:
Alastair from Brighton says: How can it be that officers who use racist language on a daily basis aren't dismissed as a matter of course?

Rick Naylor:
Well if I can reassure Alastair, they are dismissed. When these issues come to the notice of senior officers very, very quickly they are disciplined and they leave the service. What is unfortunate is that perhaps colleagues around them aren't prepared to inform on them, if you like, or shop them and our view in the association - the Superintendents' Association - is there's no dishonour in shopping a racist, the dishonour is allowing that person to remain in the police service. So we would appeal to all police officers and police staff that if they come across colleagues using inappropriate behaviour or inappropriate language that they make that known to senior officers and then they can be dealt with. It is very difficult because sometimes the whistle blower, as they're called, they're victimised themselves and we need to make sure that there are sufficient support mechanisms in place to help that person through what would undoubtedly be a traumatic experience.

Newshost:
Talking about fellow police officers, Keith Clothier, who comes from somewhere in England, he hasn't said where specifically, says: As a serving police officer I was horrified at the behaviour and attitudes of the racist recruits in the programme. The BBC's done the public and the police a great service in exposing this but I'm concerned that the public have been left with the impression that a high proportion of police officers hold the same sick views. What can be done now to regain the public's trust in the police?

Rick Naylor:
Well clearly I share Keith's concern there and what we need to do is to redouble our efforts. A lot of work has gone on in all police forces up and down the country since Lawrence, we need to keep that work going, we need to not take our eye of this ball for one moment to make sure that all the programmes that we do, all the training that we do, both in the classroom and in the workplace, is geared towards making sure that everybody's attitudes are the ones that we all hope them to be and that we don't allow this sort of cancer to grow any further in the service. And I'm sure, I'm convinced, as a police officer with 28 years service that it is a very, very small minority of people in the police service that hold these disgusting views but we need to make sure that we get rid of them, we need to make sure that the people coming into the service don't hold those views in the first place and we need to support individuals who are willing and courageous enough to say that my colleague has said this, that or the other or my colleague has done this, that and the other which is totally inappropriate.

Newshost:
There are suggestions of course that we could go a bit further than that, Misbah from London has just e-mailed in, just now, saying: Shouldn't the same operations be carried out on a random basis across all police forces to root those serving officers who've already successfully evaded detection? I think the suggestion there being that there should be undercover operations run by police forces to try and root out racists, a bit perhaps like London are doing in terms of rooting out corrupt officers.

Rick Naylor:
I'm sure that's something that will be considered by the police service and the Home Office as well. We need to look at that carefully to make sure it's done properly and lawfully of course because even if they are racists we have to deal with them as police officers in a lawful manner - the rules that are laid down to cover such things as surveillance, such as gathering evidence.

Newshost:
And of course almost all forces in England and Wales are trying to increase the number of recruits they have from the various minority communities and we've had an e-mail from Nadeem in London saying: I set my heart on serving the police and serving the community but after seeing last night's documentary I think I may be forced to change my mind. What reassurances can you give to a young Asian man, like myself, who's dedicated to joining the police service but who's scared about the consequences?

Rick Naylor:
Well whatever I say I hope I can encourage Nadeem to join the police service because one thing that did show in that programme more than anything and the thought that crossed my mind is we haven't got enough members of the ethnic minorities in the police service. We need far more and then these views just won't - they won't have any ground there to grow. One of the biggest disappointments I've found and one of the most disgusting things in the programme, apart from all the dreadful language that was used, was that how they victimised and turned on the Asian recruit in the programme in their class. But we need to make sure that that doesn't happen again, even in training or when the officers are out of training and working in the workplace but we need more. Once we've got more these views won't take hold at all.

Newshost:
Okay well Ashish from Blackpool says: Every year there is a new scandal about police racism and every year the same people come out and say more will be done to tackle it. - I suppose you can't necessarily be accused of that as you've just been made president-elect. - But given the lack of results can you tell me exactly what the police are doing and why it isn't working?

Rick Naylor:
They're doing a vast variety of things. I know in my part of the world, up here in Yorkshire, we are in a very innovative scheme called The Race To Train programme, where we use a theatre company to bring out attitudes and behaviours and to challenge them in a safe environment so that we can all learn from the other person's point of view, so to speak. And there are schemes like that going on all over the country. A lot of energy is being put into how we train and how we guide our officers and make sure that we don't unwittingly - I mean the Lawrence Inquiry talked to us about institutional racism, that we weren't really aware that what we were doing was racist. What the programme showed the other night was that there's overt racism as well. So we need to tackle both and that is one of the challenges that we now find after The Secret Policeman's programme.

Newshost:
Okay well Christopher Beddow has e-mailed in, this links to what you were talking about, whistle blowers, a bit earlier: There is a culture of racism in the police which is too far ingrained to be banished by the actions of a few undercover whistle blowers. Should we establish and strengthen independent bodies to root out hateful police officers in all ranks of the force? So I suppose that's a suggestion that anyone who's doing any undercover operations may be should be external.

Rick Naylor:
Well there is an independent police commission coming into being on the 1st April next year. Not specifically set up for this problem but set up to actually bring a big element of independence into complaints into the police. So it may be something that the Government and the Home Office want to think about and talk to the IPCC if they've got the capability when they are actually up and running on the 1st April to take something on like this.

Newshost:
Harvey Mann from Wolverhampton has just e-mailed us in this minute saying: Do you honestly believe that once an individual holds racist views that by educating them those views can be eradicated? And Richard Batey from Newcastle says: Do you agree that as long as the police are being seen as racist they'll continue to attract recruits holding similar views?

Rick Naylor:
Well those two are very, very important questions. The first one, I mean I subscribe personally to the philosophy that leopards don't change their spots, so it is easy to say that once a racist always a racist. But I'm also from the school that we should give people a chance to change their behaviour and show them the error of their ways, to give them a chance to reform if you like. But we've got as a caring and responsible employer - we've got to be there to provide this sort of training, to provide the guidelines and the guidance to our people, not just police officers but police staff as well, police civilian staff, to show that these views and this behaviour is unacceptable and we've got to move on from the position we are today. It's not going to be an easy job, nobody ever thought it would be an easy job after the Lawrence report, it is something that's going to take a long time. And I'm naturally an optimist, I think we can eradicate it, I'm sure we can eradicate it and we've got to not give up the ghost and throw our hands up in horror, we've just got to keep working at it and occasionally there will be set backs, that's life unfortunately, it sometimes comes up and hits you in the face, like it did the other night on the television screen. But we've got to dust ourselves off, we've got to get back on the train and keep working and that's the only way we're going to succeed.

Newshost:
And finally a Mr Jarral from London says: When will the police start learning to involve local communities in solving their problems? And he's suggesting that that's what the NHS have been doing and perhaps the police ought to be looking more at that, that you involve the local community, discuss what needs to be done and perhaps from that you'll pick up how to make sure that racism isn't spreading through the forces.

Rick Naylor:
Well the local communities are involved now, they're involved very closely in policing and the whole range of policing initiatives. Local commanders consult their communities on a regular basis to find out the way that they can go forward policing in their areas. I think this is a good idea to include how can we make sure that we cater for all the needs of all our various communities up and down the country and to bring in this element of how can we deal with the racist element? It may well be a very, very good idea.

Newshost:
Thank you very much Chief Superintendent Rick Naylor and thank you for joining us. That's it for the interactive forum this afternoon. Goodbye.