ìThe principle of non-discrimination is too important to be cast aside without compelling reasonsî, says Jayne Monkhouse in Equal Opportunities Review, in response to calls from police groups to allow forces to discriminate in favour of under-represented groups.
At least two police forces so far have had to pay out compensation for discriminating against white male candidates, as a result of positive discrimination. Police forces in England and Wales have been set challenging, if not impossible, diversity targets for representation of ethnic minorities and women amongst staff, and many are struggling to get anywhere near those targets.
For the larger, metropolitan forces in areas with a high proportion of ethnic minority population, the rate of recruitment over the 10-year target period is simply not enough to achieve the levels of ethnic minority officers required by the Home Office targets. Even if all recruits in the period were women, many forces would still not meet the targets set for female representation.
Consequently, there have been calls for changes to the law to allow ìaffirmative actionî ñ so that forces can choose candidates from under-represented groups in preference to white, male candidates from a pool of successful applicants. This is positive discrimination, and unlawful under the current legislation.
But such a change to the law should be resisted, says Jayne Monkhouse in Equal Opportunities Review. Other changes are needed before such a drastic measure is considered. A culture change is needed to make the service more attractive to ethnic minorities, women and other under-represented groups. This would help retention rates, as well as recruitment.
In the article, Monkhouse points out that there are positive action measures allowed by the law. ëPositive actioní allows employers to provide special treatment for groups that are under-represented so that everyone can compete for job opportunities on a level playing field. It is a legal means of increasing the pool of suitable candidates. But she finds that police forces have made little use of such action. Few have run any positive action events and none has produced a positive action plan. Until such measures are taken, to produce a change in the culture of the police service, ìfiddling with the numbers will not achieve changeî.
Police forces continue to pay out for discrimination in an attempt to meet diversity targets
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