Macpherson adviser says Met Police is still racist

The Met Police has failed to learn all the lessons of the Macpherson Inquiry and remains institutionally racist, says one of the three men who oversaw the Stephen Lawrence report.

Dr Richard Stone chaired the Runnymede Trust's review of police, titled The Stephen Lawrence Inquiry 10 Years On. The teenager was killed in a racist knife attack by a group of white youths in Eltham in 1993.

Sir William Macpherson - whose inquiry criticised police for their handling of the murder investigation - was advised by Dr Stone, John Sentamu, now Archbishop of York and Tom Cook, former West Yorkshire police chief.

Dr Stone's review praises the Met for great improvements in professionalism and first-aid training but says there is "institutional lethargy" in its bid to improve the recruitment, retention and promotion of officers from ethnic minorities.

Nationally, the number of non-white officers has increased by two per cent to four per cent in 10 years - well short of a target of seven per cent.

The Met appears to exceed this target with a figure of about 25 per cent, but most of those recruits are Police Community Support Officers.

Dr Stone said the Met had achieved little in this area despite plenty of effort: "You wonder whether the institution lacks the drive to make it work."

He warned that the early retirement of former assistant commissioner Tarique Ghaffur after a racism row had left multi-ethnic officers even more under-represented among senior police, adding: "There's only one chief constable in Britain who is black, Michael Fuller in Kent. When he goes, there won't be anyone to take a top job."

Dr Stone said that in 1999 black men in London were six times more likely to be targeted and today they are seven times more likely to be stopped than white men.

That the failure to properly address the issue was damaging the Met's ability to fight crime, he said.