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BRITISH police carried out the highest number of stop-and-searches in seven years, with the figure rising more than 50 per cent in 12 months, official figures revealed yesterday.
Home Office figures found that there were 558,973 stop-and-searches carried out in the year up to March, with the Metropolitan Police accounting for half of the increase.
People from Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) backgrounds were stopped at a rate 4.1 times higher than those who were white – a similar trend to the previous year.
Stand Up To Racism co-convenor Weyman Bennett told the Star: “This Tory government has put in relentless racist legislation in order to divide people.
“The hostile environment and Windrush scandal have been augmented by the unleashing of police on black communities which continue to bear the brunt of the failed economic policy of austerity.”
A Home Office spokesperson said that stop-and-search was a “vital tool” for taking weapons off the streets and preventing deaths, adding that more than “11,000 knives, firearms and other weapons” were removed in 2019/20.
