Badenoch claims police who arrested Henry Nowak influenced by guidance saying hate crimes should be treated as priority Kemi Badenoch starts by talking about the video filmed by the police as they arrested Henry Nowak. She says it was hard to watch because she “found myself willing the police to stop, to at least consider Henry’s story and check if he had been stabbed”. She says she met Nowak’s family last week. They do not want this case to be used to divide people. She goes on: double quotation markThey want the police to become an institution that we can trust again. And if we want to honour that wish to honour Henry’s memory, we need to ask the right question. I believe that question is why did the police take an accusation of racism more seriously than the claim that Henry had been stabbed? This question goes beyond policing. Why are public bodies so unable to act with common sense when race or identity is involved? Why are they so distracted, busying themselves with things that have nothing to do with their core function? Badenoch says the speech she is giving today is the basis of work she has been doing for months on equality law. Some of what she says will be “very uncomfortable” for some people. She goes on: double quotation markIn some ways I feel for those police officers because they were following guidance. They have been trained on guidance which does not apply equality under the law. Guidance which says hate crimes should be treated as a priority. Many people don’t know what is in this guidance and that is why it needs to be exposed. UPDATE: As explained earlier (see 9.20am), the judge who presided over the trial of Nowak’s killer did not endorse this theory in his summing up. Key events Badenoch says she agrees with Idris Elba having ‘woke James Bond would ‘ruin entire franchise’ Q: Idris Elba says audiences do not want to see a black actor playing James Bond. Would you like to see someone from a different background playing 007? Badenoch replied: double quotation markI agree with Idris Elba that we should not make James Bond woke because that will ruin the entire franchise. But Badenoch said that was a decision for the people who make the films. And audiences would deliver their verdict. She believed in capitalism, she said, and that was how it worked. Q: It is almost 10 years since Theresa May gave her ‘burning injustices’ speech when she became PM. She said: “If you’re black, you’re treated more harshly by the criminal justice system than if you’re white.” Do you think those injustices have been tackled? Badenoch said she wishes May had spoken to her before the speech, because she would have encouraged her to frame it differently. double quotation markI do believe that everyone suffers injustice; it doesn’t matter the colour of your skin. I do think that if you are an ethnic minority, or any kind of minority, it is the fact of being in a minority that means that you are probably more likely to experience something that the majority group does not, whatever minority you are. That is a fact. That is why we have an Equality Act. That is why those laws are there to prevent discrimination. But when you have public bodies then going beyond preventing discrimination to achieve outcomes, try and do something different, and accept any mention of racism as true without examining the facts, that is a problem. Badenoch says identity-based staff networks in police, and public organisations, should not have say over policy Q: Are you opposed to the police and other public sector organisations allowing staff to set up and run groups for staff members from different minority ethnic groups? Badenoch said she did not like groups like this. But she believed in freedom of association. She went on: double quotation markIf you are black police officers and you want to hang out together and go to the pub, or play tennis, that’s fine. But should you organise within the police and start changing policy on the basis of your race? No. And the way I know that that is not the right answer is because if you swap the races and if you had the White Police Officers Association and said that they should start making policy for white people in the police, I think everyone would be up in arms .. I don’t think those identity networks in the civil service, or the police, should have any say in public policy or how those organisations are run. Q: Do you think Sadiq Khan, the Labour mayor of London, was right to stop the Met police signing a contract with Palantir? What do you think of that? Badenoch agreed that was an example of Khan putting ideology ahead of the need to focus on getting results. Badenoch says she wants more black boys subject to stop and search even if that leads to ‘outcry’, because policy works Q: Do you think subjecting more black boys to stop and search could inflame tensions? Badenoch dismissed this concern. She said: double quotation markSome people who will feel uncomfortable. But the truth is that, when black boys are searched, more knives are found. The incidence of knife carrying is higher. So we can’t leave people to carry knives because we think that we’ve we searched enough people for today because that means someone else’s life gets lost. And the people who tell me more than anyone that they want to stop and search are the mothers of young black boys who have been killed by their peers … I’m not going to run away from an outcry and allow other people’s children to be killed, just so I can have a quiet life. That is not fair. Q: Have you got plans to go further in changing equality law, or is it just this? Badenoch said she had been looking at this for years and there was “a lot that needs to be done”. She said her party was also looking at how this applied in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland because those countries were all run by parties that want to break up the UK. She said she wanted to stop “lawfare” in a range of areas. Badenoch accuses police leaders of wrongly accepted their officers institutionally racist Q: Do you think the police can be trusted to deal with racially-charged outcomes? Badenoch replied: double quotation markI do think that most frontline police officers are good people. I think a lot of the issues have actually been with the senior police chiefs. They were the ones who I spoke to, and they were the ones who told me, ‘Come on, you don’t understand. We really are institutionally racist’, and then could not explain exactly how they were. Badenoch said this was not an anti-police speech. double quotation markThis is not an anti-police speech. It’s actually pro-police because I want to free them to be able to do their jobs without worrying about box ticking or compliance on issues that are not core to the function of saving lives and catching criminals. Kemi Badenoch speaking at the IfG. Photograph: James Manning/PA Badenoch claims public sector equality duty ‘creating inequality of outcomes’ Q; Are you giving up on trying to reduce inequality of outcomes? Badenoch claimed that the public sector equality duty was “creating inequality of outcomes”. And it was destroying trust in institutions, she said. Q: What is your response to the attack in Northern Ireland? A Somalian man has now been arrested on suspicion of attempted murder? Badenoch replied: double quotation markI’m absolutely horrified. It is a horrific incident. I haven’t heard anything about who the, attacker might have been, but I think a lot of people will start wondering yet again, is this someone who should not have been in our country? Have there been failings around our borders? I would urge the police to bring the facts out as quickly as possible so that we can get some clarity. Q: What do you say to people who argue that, if the requirement to think people may need to be treated differently is not in law, people might not do it? And did you ever propose getting rid of the public sector equality duty when you were in government? On her message to people who think the law is needed, Badenoch said: double quotation markI would say to those people that the Equality Act protects your rights, but we need to make sure that we do not create a society where people retreat into groups. We are seeing separatism in our country occur because different people are being treated differently. And when you have that, there will be a backlash. And, on her time in government, she said she did not propose getting rid of the public sector equality duty. But, having written “thousands of letters” about how the Equality Act should be applied, “I’ve decided that people just need to have this public sector equality duty removed because when I try to get them to think more carefully and sensibly about it, they ignored it.” Q: Do you accept the principle that some people need to be treated differently? Badenoch replied: double quotation markDo I believe that people need to be treated differently in certain circumstances? Yes. But the principle remains the same, that we are equal under the law … Badenoch said ‘“common sense” was the solution. double quotation markOf course, there are incidents of racism, but you don’t need to ask the police to accept as a fact anyone saying this is racist, irrespective of what is in front of them, irrespective of the circumstances … That’s what I’m saying. Let’s bring equal treatment back. Badenoch is now taking media questions. Q: Doesn’t it make sense for public sector workers to take things like disability into account when dealing with people? You will take away that requirement. Badenoch said she was bringing back common sense. double quotation markYou don’t need a duty to tell you to take account of differences. Quite often differences are obvious. We don’t need the protected characteristic of age and the public sector equality duty to tell us not to treat children in the same way that we treat adults. What is happening is that people have stopped thinking and are just trying to follow the process, so they don’t get into trouble. I want people to bring their judgement back. Badenoch says public service workers do not need equality law to get them to treat people fairly Badenoch said people did not need the public sector equality duty to act properly in public services. double quotation markI have trust in people. I don’t believe the public service is full of lots of racists and people who don’t care about disability, and unless they’re giving this box to tick, they’re not going to do that. I don’t believe that. And we should stop enshrining that belief. I say this listening to other ethnic minorities, especially young people – it makes them feel that every white person is racist and it’s only the law that is protecting them. That is not what our country is. We need to change the culture. We need to sweep all of this stuff away … The law of diminishing returns is applying to these regulations. We need to get back to the core function of public services – frontline delivery. Badenoch dismisses claims savings from getting rid of public sector equality duty would be minimal Badenoch is now taking questions. The first come from Hannah White, head of the IfG. Q: How will scrapping the public sector equality duty lead to better services in areas like health? Badenoch said this would stop “officials from wasting their time on a lot of things that have nothing to do with delivering frontline services”. White said public spending on EDI initiatives was actually very small. Badenoch said the second, third, fourth order consequences of the way the people are carrying out their jobs [in line with equality law] is wasting a lot of time and money”. She said the Tories had estimated the cost of this at £420m. But the consquences went further, she said. double quotation markIf you look at the actions and the loss of trust, this is costing us billions. We need to get people focussed on delivering their core functions. Badenoch said that the Conservatives wanted more use of stop and search. double quotation markAnd the reason why we want to triple stop and search and hire 10,000 more police officers is because we believe that this will lead to safer streets. I’m afraid it doesn’t matter if more black boys are searched because it will mean more black lives are saved. Badenoch said confidence in the police was collapsing. double quotation markConfidence in our institutions is now collapsing and how could it not? When people can see, as we do in my own constituency, Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities breaking laws that no one else would get away with,\ When rapists are being put in women’s prisons because the justice system prioritises the protected characteristic of gender reassignment over women’s privacy, dignity and safety. When people see pro-Palestinian marchers chanting slogans that others would be sent to jail for tweeting. Yes, people will believe in two tier policing when they see this. Common sense has gone out of the window and people are left wondering which rules apply to whom. Badenoch said fear of being seen as racist led to a box ticking culture. double quotation markThese institutions stopped worrying about getting the law wrong and worried desperately about a career ending accusation of racism. The safest path for them to avoid this accusation was not common sense or the facts in front of them. It was to follow the process. So people replaced thinking with box ticking. They outsourced decision making to activists and left wing pressure groups. Badenoch said the Nottingham killings, the Southport attack and the Henry Nowak case were all different, but they showed “a common weakness” in the system. double quotation markAuthorities conditioned to see minority status as victimhood. They withhold information, they avoid difficult conversations, and they allow reputational concerns to dominate their decision making. They have spent so long worrying about institutional racism that they have become institutionally incompetent. They are systematically failing to fulfil their role to do what they are there to do. Badenoch says fear of being accused of racism is leading to authorities not intervening early to prevent crime Badenoch said the fear of being accused of racism was leading to the authorities not acting early in a way that would prevent crime. double quotation markWhat do the Nottingham murders, the Southport attack, the Manchester Arena bombings and the rape gangs all have in common? All these crimes could have been stopped if people had intervened instead of having a fear of being called racist. We would not have had so many girls abused by rape gangs if local authorities had not looked away because they were too scared to point out the obvious. That’s why those unspeakable crimes went on for years. Post navigation বড় আকারের বিক্ষোভের মধ্যে বলিভিয়া জরুরি অবস্থার দিকে এগিয়ে যাচ্ছে ৪টি রাজ্যে ভোট হচ্ছে। এবং, নতুন প্রতিবেদন অনুসারে বিশ্বব্যাপী সংঘাত বাড়ছে
Badenoch claims police who arrested Henry Nowak influenced by guidance saying hate crimes should be treated as priority Kemi Badenoch starts by talking about the video filmed by the police as they arrested Henry Nowak. She says it was hard to watch because she “found myself willing the police to stop, to at least consider Henry’s story and check if he had been stabbed”. She says she met Nowak’s family last week. They do not want this case to be used to divide people. She goes on: double quotation markThey want the police to become an institution that we can trust again. And if we want to honour that wish to honour Henry’s memory, we need to ask the right question. I believe that question is why did the police take an accusation of racism more seriously than the claim that Henry had been stabbed? This question goes beyond policing. Why are public bodies so unable to act with common sense when race or identity is involved? Why are they so distracted, busying themselves with things that have nothing to do with their core function? Badenoch says the speech she is giving today is the basis of work she has been doing for months on equality law. Some of what she says will be “very uncomfortable” for some people. She goes on: double quotation markIn some ways I feel for those police officers because they were following guidance. They have been trained on guidance which does not apply equality under the law. Guidance which says hate crimes should be treated as a priority. Many people don’t know what is in this guidance and that is why it needs to be exposed. UPDATE: As explained earlier (see 9.20am), the judge who presided over the trial of Nowak’s killer did not endorse this theory in his summing up.
Badenoch says she agrees with Idris Elba having ‘woke James Bond would ‘ruin entire franchise’ Q: Idris Elba says audiences do not want to see a black actor playing James Bond. Would you like to see someone from a different background playing 007? Badenoch replied: double quotation markI agree with Idris Elba that we should not make James Bond woke because that will ruin the entire franchise. But Badenoch said that was a decision for the people who make the films. And audiences would deliver their verdict. She believed in capitalism, she said, and that was how it worked.
Q: It is almost 10 years since Theresa May gave her ‘burning injustices’ speech when she became PM. She said: “If you’re black, you’re treated more harshly by the criminal justice system than if you’re white.” Do you think those injustices have been tackled? Badenoch said she wishes May had spoken to her before the speech, because she would have encouraged her to frame it differently. double quotation markI do believe that everyone suffers injustice; it doesn’t matter the colour of your skin. I do think that if you are an ethnic minority, or any kind of minority, it is the fact of being in a minority that means that you are probably more likely to experience something that the majority group does not, whatever minority you are. That is a fact. That is why we have an Equality Act. That is why those laws are there to prevent discrimination. But when you have public bodies then going beyond preventing discrimination to achieve outcomes, try and do something different, and accept any mention of racism as true without examining the facts, that is a problem.
Badenoch says identity-based staff networks in police, and public organisations, should not have say over policy Q: Are you opposed to the police and other public sector organisations allowing staff to set up and run groups for staff members from different minority ethnic groups? Badenoch said she did not like groups like this. But she believed in freedom of association. She went on: double quotation markIf you are black police officers and you want to hang out together and go to the pub, or play tennis, that’s fine. But should you organise within the police and start changing policy on the basis of your race? No. And the way I know that that is not the right answer is because if you swap the races and if you had the White Police Officers Association and said that they should start making policy for white people in the police, I think everyone would be up in arms .. I don’t think those identity networks in the civil service, or the police, should have any say in public policy or how those organisations are run.
Q: Do you think Sadiq Khan, the Labour mayor of London, was right to stop the Met police signing a contract with Palantir? What do you think of that? Badenoch agreed that was an example of Khan putting ideology ahead of the need to focus on getting results.
Badenoch says she wants more black boys subject to stop and search even if that leads to ‘outcry’, because policy works Q: Do you think subjecting more black boys to stop and search could inflame tensions? Badenoch dismissed this concern. She said: double quotation markSome people who will feel uncomfortable. But the truth is that, when black boys are searched, more knives are found. The incidence of knife carrying is higher. So we can’t leave people to carry knives because we think that we’ve we searched enough people for today because that means someone else’s life gets lost. And the people who tell me more than anyone that they want to stop and search are the mothers of young black boys who have been killed by their peers … I’m not going to run away from an outcry and allow other people’s children to be killed, just so I can have a quiet life. That is not fair.
Q: Have you got plans to go further in changing equality law, or is it just this? Badenoch said she had been looking at this for years and there was “a lot that needs to be done”. She said her party was also looking at how this applied in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland because those countries were all run by parties that want to break up the UK. She said she wanted to stop “lawfare” in a range of areas.
Badenoch accuses police leaders of wrongly accepted their officers institutionally racist Q: Do you think the police can be trusted to deal with racially-charged outcomes? Badenoch replied: double quotation markI do think that most frontline police officers are good people. I think a lot of the issues have actually been with the senior police chiefs. They were the ones who I spoke to, and they were the ones who told me, ‘Come on, you don’t understand. We really are institutionally racist’, and then could not explain exactly how they were. Badenoch said this was not an anti-police speech. double quotation markThis is not an anti-police speech. It’s actually pro-police because I want to free them to be able to do their jobs without worrying about box ticking or compliance on issues that are not core to the function of saving lives and catching criminals. Kemi Badenoch speaking at the IfG. Photograph: James Manning/PA
Badenoch claims public sector equality duty ‘creating inequality of outcomes’ Q; Are you giving up on trying to reduce inequality of outcomes? Badenoch claimed that the public sector equality duty was “creating inequality of outcomes”. And it was destroying trust in institutions, she said.
Q: What is your response to the attack in Northern Ireland? A Somalian man has now been arrested on suspicion of attempted murder? Badenoch replied: double quotation markI’m absolutely horrified. It is a horrific incident. I haven’t heard anything about who the, attacker might have been, but I think a lot of people will start wondering yet again, is this someone who should not have been in our country? Have there been failings around our borders? I would urge the police to bring the facts out as quickly as possible so that we can get some clarity.
Q: What do you say to people who argue that, if the requirement to think people may need to be treated differently is not in law, people might not do it? And did you ever propose getting rid of the public sector equality duty when you were in government? On her message to people who think the law is needed, Badenoch said: double quotation markI would say to those people that the Equality Act protects your rights, but we need to make sure that we do not create a society where people retreat into groups. We are seeing separatism in our country occur because different people are being treated differently. And when you have that, there will be a backlash. And, on her time in government, she said she did not propose getting rid of the public sector equality duty. But, having written “thousands of letters” about how the Equality Act should be applied, “I’ve decided that people just need to have this public sector equality duty removed because when I try to get them to think more carefully and sensibly about it, they ignored it.”
Q: Do you accept the principle that some people need to be treated differently? Badenoch replied: double quotation markDo I believe that people need to be treated differently in certain circumstances? Yes. But the principle remains the same, that we are equal under the law … Badenoch said ‘“common sense” was the solution. double quotation markOf course, there are incidents of racism, but you don’t need to ask the police to accept as a fact anyone saying this is racist, irrespective of what is in front of them, irrespective of the circumstances … That’s what I’m saying. Let’s bring equal treatment back.
Badenoch is now taking media questions. Q: Doesn’t it make sense for public sector workers to take things like disability into account when dealing with people? You will take away that requirement. Badenoch said she was bringing back common sense. double quotation markYou don’t need a duty to tell you to take account of differences. Quite often differences are obvious. We don’t need the protected characteristic of age and the public sector equality duty to tell us not to treat children in the same way that we treat adults. What is happening is that people have stopped thinking and are just trying to follow the process, so they don’t get into trouble. I want people to bring their judgement back.
Badenoch says public service workers do not need equality law to get them to treat people fairly Badenoch said people did not need the public sector equality duty to act properly in public services. double quotation markI have trust in people. I don’t believe the public service is full of lots of racists and people who don’t care about disability, and unless they’re giving this box to tick, they’re not going to do that. I don’t believe that. And we should stop enshrining that belief. I say this listening to other ethnic minorities, especially young people – it makes them feel that every white person is racist and it’s only the law that is protecting them. That is not what our country is. We need to change the culture. We need to sweep all of this stuff away … The law of diminishing returns is applying to these regulations. We need to get back to the core function of public services – frontline delivery.
Badenoch dismisses claims savings from getting rid of public sector equality duty would be minimal Badenoch is now taking questions. The first come from Hannah White, head of the IfG. Q: How will scrapping the public sector equality duty lead to better services in areas like health? Badenoch said this would stop “officials from wasting their time on a lot of things that have nothing to do with delivering frontline services”. White said public spending on EDI initiatives was actually very small. Badenoch said the second, third, fourth order consequences of the way the people are carrying out their jobs [in line with equality law] is wasting a lot of time and money”. She said the Tories had estimated the cost of this at £420m. But the consquences went further, she said. double quotation markIf you look at the actions and the loss of trust, this is costing us billions. We need to get people focussed on delivering their core functions.
Badenoch said that the Conservatives wanted more use of stop and search. double quotation markAnd the reason why we want to triple stop and search and hire 10,000 more police officers is because we believe that this will lead to safer streets. I’m afraid it doesn’t matter if more black boys are searched because it will mean more black lives are saved.
Badenoch said confidence in the police was collapsing. double quotation markConfidence in our institutions is now collapsing and how could it not? When people can see, as we do in my own constituency, Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities breaking laws that no one else would get away with,\ When rapists are being put in women’s prisons because the justice system prioritises the protected characteristic of gender reassignment over women’s privacy, dignity and safety. When people see pro-Palestinian marchers chanting slogans that others would be sent to jail for tweeting. Yes, people will believe in two tier policing when they see this. Common sense has gone out of the window and people are left wondering which rules apply to whom. Badenoch said fear of being seen as racist led to a box ticking culture. double quotation markThese institutions stopped worrying about getting the law wrong and worried desperately about a career ending accusation of racism. The safest path for them to avoid this accusation was not common sense or the facts in front of them. It was to follow the process. So people replaced thinking with box ticking. They outsourced decision making to activists and left wing pressure groups.
Badenoch said the Nottingham killings, the Southport attack and the Henry Nowak case were all different, but they showed “a common weakness” in the system. double quotation markAuthorities conditioned to see minority status as victimhood. They withhold information, they avoid difficult conversations, and they allow reputational concerns to dominate their decision making. They have spent so long worrying about institutional racism that they have become institutionally incompetent. They are systematically failing to fulfil their role to do what they are there to do.
Badenoch says fear of being accused of racism is leading to authorities not intervening early to prevent crime Badenoch said the fear of being accused of racism was leading to the authorities not acting early in a way that would prevent crime. double quotation markWhat do the Nottingham murders, the Southport attack, the Manchester Arena bombings and the rape gangs all have in common? All these crimes could have been stopped if people had intervened instead of having a fear of being called racist. We would not have had so many girls abused by rape gangs if local authorities had not looked away because they were too scared to point out the obvious. That’s why those unspeakable crimes went on for years.