Met's PC madness

Scotland Yard is at the centre of a political correctness row today after changing how it officially describes black and Asian people.

Metropolitan Police officers have been banned from using the phrase "ethnic minority".

Instead they must use the term "black and minority ethnic communities/people".

But the National Black Police Association said the switch - which could cost up to £1 million to implement - was a "waste of time and money".

Ray Powell, association president, said: "I find it ridiculous the amount of time and effort being spent on this. Our communities are concerned with how they are treated rather than how they are referred to. These words are just superficial. The money would be better spent developing our communities rather than changing words in documents."

Metropolitan Police Authority-MPA) documents confirm that three phrases - "visible ethnic minority", "black and ethnic minority" and "ethnic minority" - have been banned. "black and minority ethnic communities/people" was deemed more appropriate and "grammatically better".

After four months of deliberations, the Met's head of human resources told officers of the change yesterday in an email. The memo said the new phrase was "widely used" across public services, including the Greater London Authority group.

Kirsten Hearn, head of the MPA diversity committee behind the ruling, said the switch would have no financial-implications. But sources said changing the Met's training procedures, documents and computers could cost "hundreds of thousands of pounds". Updating databases would cost ?50,000 a time.

If the idea was adopted across England and Wales, the bill could run to millions, they claimed. Other MPA members-such as Richard Barnes, said they struggled to tell the difference between "ethnic minority" and "minority ethnic" communities. "Actions such as this bring into disrepute all the good work we do to promote equal opportunities and diversity because they bring us down to a ridiculous level," he said.