‘Unfortunately, there are people in power, like Mr Matthews, who use their position to undermine progress’
Reform’s new police commissioner, Rupert Matthews, has come under fire for criticising a police plan to tackle racism.
Matthews, who defected from the Tories to Reform this week, called the plan an “abomination” at a Reform press conference.
The Leicestershire police and crime commissioner said on Monday that the police race action plan was “a disgrace” and an “abomination”. He also claimed it meant “people should be treated differently depending on which ethnic group they came from”.
“That is a disgrace and the very epitome of two-tier policing,” he said.
He added: “We need to cut the dark heart of wokeness out of our criminal justice system.”
The Police Race Action Plan aims to tackle racism in the force and rebuild trust with Black people. It was adopted in 2020 in response to the murder of George Floyd by a police officer in the US.
Speaking to the Mirror, Abimbola Johnson, the head of the Independent Scrutiny and Oversight board, the police racism watchdog, challenged Matthews’ comments.
Johnson said: “The suggestion that the Police Race Action Plan asks for people to be treated differently depending on their ethnicity fundamentally misrepresents the purpose and findings of the programme.”
She added that “The uncomfortable truth is that racially minoritised communities, particularly Black people, are already treated differently by our policing system. The intention of PRAP is to deal with those disparities.”
“Unfortunately, there are people in power, like Mr Matthews, who use their position to undermine progress rather than push policing towards improvement in key areas such as anti-racism.”
Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward
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