from "Stop and search: white people held 'to balance racial statistics," by Robert Verkaik, the Independent
White members of the public are being unlawfully detained by the police in order to give "racial balance" to stop-and-search statistics, a report by the Government's watchdog on terror laws has found.
Lord Carlile, the independent reviewer of terrorism legislation, said he knew of cases where suspects were stopped by officers even though there was no evidence or suspicion against them.
He warned that police were wasting money by carrying out "self-evidently unmerited searches" which were an invasion of civil liberties and "almost certainly unlawful".
Lord Carlile, a QC and Liberal Democrat peer, condemned the wrongful use of Section 44 of the Terrorism Act 2000, in his annual report on anti-terror laws.
He said police were carrying out the searches on people they had no basis for suspecting so they could avoid accusations of prejudice.
As the terror threat against Britain is largely from Islamist extremists, the figures show disproportionately more Muslims and therefore more Asians being searched than whites.
But the peer said police should stop trying to balance the figures, and it may be that an "ethnic imbalance" is a "proportional consequence" of policing. (more)
Coincidentally, two years ago, I wrote the following to a friend:
"Can you believe that, while boarding my U.S.-bound plane in London, I was singled out for random security bag searches? Yes, they chose me - not the Indians or Arabs surrounding me who, evidentally in an effort to promote every negative stereotype known, were impatient, rude and pushing to get on the plane. I believe my selection for a random search was more or less an attempt to make a political statement, to put on a display "non-discriminatory treatment" and demonstrate the absence of racial profiling (which is, incidentally, profiling in and of itself). What can be said about the West when it discriminates against European-descended peoples so as not to be accused of discriminating against "foreign looking" peoples?
In my bag, airline personnel found a beer can I had tracked down for my dad because it was unique and rare. Security confiscated this "weapon" despite it having passed through all normal security checks - in both Berlin and London. While my can was being confiscated, I was thinking of how ironic it would be if some of the foreign-looking people on my flight who, surely to spite allegations of racism, had not been singled out for a search, turned out to be terrorists. I was thinking about this as I boarded the plane, too - and even more as the plane was taxied down the runway, cleared for takeoff and then, at the last minute, called back to be searched through by security for over an hour.
Apparently, a "mysterious item" had been found on board. They later told us, en route, that an unclaimed cell phone had been found and that had supposedly triggered worries about bigger things, like an explosive somehow being wired inside the phone or being used to identify the plane and somehow plant a bomb on it between flights. Needless to say, nothing else was found and my homeward journey continued. But I was acutely aware - and surely others were too - that the demographics on the plane looked more like Qatar or India than anything I would consider "home", and yet, deep down, I knew that most of the passengers were U.S. citizens. It made me wonder exactly whose "home" I was returning to - the home where anybody can make a home, and those from the same stock as the Founders are treated like strangers and terrorists as a result. Once again, the political had entered the realm of everyday life, on a left-wing afternoon."
