FOI 720/26

Request

 

Please provide the following information for the period 1 January 2020 to 31 December 2025:

 

1. The total number of allegations, complaints, or misconduct reports alleging racism, racial discrimination, racial harassment, or racially discriminatory behaviour made against police officers and/or police staff.
2. For each allegation or complaint, please provide:

* The year in which the allegation was made.

* The ethnicity of the complainant, where recorded.

* The ethnicity of the officer or member of police staff who was the subject of the allegation, where recorded.

* Whether the allegation was upheld, not upheld, withdrawn, discontinued, or remains under investigation.

3. If individual-level information would exceed cost limits or engage exemptions, please provide the information in aggregated form showing:

* The number of allegations by ethnicity of complainant.

* The number of allegations by ethnicity of the officer or staff member complained about.

* The number of upheld allegations by ethnicity of complainant and alleged perpetrator, where recorded.

4. Please provide any guidance, policy documents, or recording standards used by the force when categorising allegations of racism or racial discrimination.

 

Where ethnicity data is not recorded, please indicate this and provide the number of cases for which ethnicity was unknown or not stated.

 

Response

 

We have consulted with our Professional Standards Department (PSD) who have provided the following information in relation to your request.

Question 1

 

There were 429 complaints / conduct matters regarding racism between 01/01/2020 - 31/12/2025.

 

Question 2

 

Your request for information has now been considered and I am not obliged to supply the information you have requested.         

  

In relation to this part of your request, the following exemption applies: 

  

Section 40(2) - Personal Information 

  

Section 40(2) is an absolute class based exemption and therefore the authority is not required to consider the public interest in disclosure. 

  

The Data Protection Act covers processing of personal data about a living individual.  Personal data means data which relate to a living individual who can be identified- 

1. from those data, or 
2. from those data and other information which is in the possession of,or is likely to come into the possession of, the data controller or any other person in respect of the individual.

 

Information will “relate to” a person if it is about them, linked to them, has some biographical significance for them, is used to inform decisions affecting them, has them as its main focus or impacts on them in any way. 

  

If we disclosed these details, this would provide significant detail which could identify an individual and would breach the first principle of the Data Protection Act 2018. 

  

In accordance with the Act, this letter represents a refusal notice for question 2 of your request.  

 

Question 3

 

Please see the attached excel spreadsheet entitled, ‘Response data 720_26’ for the aggregated data relating to the ethnicities of the complainants the ethnicities of the subjects of the complaints, as well as the same breakdown for ‘upheld’ complaints.

 

Please note ‘upheld’ complaints are not a category that PSD would track so the data has instead been broken down into complaints with outcomes of, “Case to Answer” or “Service not Acceptable”. There were no relevant cases with "Case to Answer" outcomes which would result in misconduct or gross misconduct proceedings, therefore the spreadsheet contains cases with "Service not acceptable" outcomes - These cases would have resulted in apologies or explanations being issued to complainants. 

 

Question 4

 

All categorisation methods of allegations of racism or racial discrimination are in line with the IOPC statutory guidance linked here: Statutory guidance - 2020 | Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC)