Race, policing and me: Inclusive leadership in the twenty-first century for the 25th anniversary of Macpherson Report and the Stephen Lawrence Inquiry

‘Race, policing and me: Inclusive leadership in the twenty-first century’ is a participant observer’s experience of policing, politics and prejudice from a 30-year career in the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) that spanned the 1993 racist murder of Stephen Lawrence, the 1999 Macpherson Report, which labelled policing institutionally racist, and the battle to come to terms with the fallout that created. A battle this observer believes policing has lost. He reveals how the most senior officer of colour in the UK for the past decade battled racism as a child, adolescent and young professional before joining a profession that did not act as it though it wanted people like him. The early successes to improve its diversity after Macpherson were not sustained and policing now rejects the term and Basu provides some thought for police leaders at how they might tackle issues of diversity and prejudice to regain their legitimacy with minorities who have been over-policed and/or under-protected for too long. To ignore this requirement to regain its legitimacy lacks the humility to understand that it is wrong about this debate on diversity. After the catastrophic loss of trust and confidence following the 2023 Dame Louise Casey Report into culture in the MPS, policing's refusal to admit it remains institutionally racist by the Macpherson definition, and indeed institutionally prejudiced by the Casey definition, imperils the Peelian concept of policing by consent. If policing cannot accept the moral case for Diversity, Equality and Inclusion, it should think of the business case that Peel, Rowan and Mayne built that underpins consent. It may be the only way to maintain order and keep communities safe, which must be its primary mission.