Black Londoners to hold largest Mayoral hustings

(from Operation Black Vote www.obv.org.uk)

In what is likely to be one of the largest Mayoral Hustings during this often acrimonious contest a coalition of Black leaders including church and business leaders, activists, faith group's others will be hosting a rally/hustings to help decide who will be next Mayor for London. Given that BME communities across the capital make up a third of all Londoners if our collective vote could be a deciding factor.

With issues ranging from transport, policing, young people, the socio economic regeneration of London alongside a discussion on health, wellbeing and planning permission this event is earmarked to be a watershed for Black Britain to decide who best matches their aspirations for London’s future.

Help us make this an event that not only demonstrates that our communities demand a say in the governance of our capital, but also right across the country.

We need all of you to be there to send an unequivocal message that we demand to be listened to; we demand greater social and racial justice.

Register here to reserve your place

Date: Thursday 12th April 2012
Address: The Gourmet Theatre, Ruach Minsitries, 197-199 Kilburn High Road, London NW6 7HY
Doors open: 6.00pm

Racism in Police Force spirals dangerously out of control



Police 'apprehend' a man in London. (photo by workerspower uk)

I have written many articles on the increasing nature of Metropolitan Police Service racism in recent times. Today devastating news: another three police officers have been referred to the IPCC for allegedly racially abusing George Asare, a young Ghanaian, first tasered and then, apparently inexplicably shot, in Lewisham South London recently.

This makes a total of 10 cases of racism referred to the IPCC and 5 police officers who are suspended and are currently being investigated for racism. The official and anecdotal evidence is that racism is spiralling dangerously out of control as resurgent and unrestrained institutional racism returns with a vengeance.



Charles Crichlow

The National Black Police Association's Charles Crichlow is so concerned that he has called for a public scrutiny by the Home affairs Select Committee. In a letter to the chair he expresses “…serious concern that Racism in the Police has gone unchecked as part of failure of Government and Police Leadership...”



I think this is right if we are to avoid further disturbances in the future the Commissioner and the former Mayor need to stop denying the reality of institutional racism.

The Commissioner has publically restated his commitment to tackling racism within the MPS, pointing out that isolated incidents of racism do not make an institutionally racist organisation.

The problem with this analysis is that it is only in the minds of the senior management board at Scotland Yard, that these latest incidents are seen in stupefying isolation.

The reality is that over the last four years London’s black communities have lost all confidence in the MPS.

A 300% increase in the use of the abusive power of poor quality stop and search has alienated huge sections of our community.

Suspicious deaths in custody have increased in the same period by 100%.

The cases of Sean Rigg, Babar Ahmed, Commander Ali Dizaei, Smiley Culture, Mark Duggan, George Asare, phone hacking, the allegations that the police investigation into the racist murder of Stephen Lawrence was derailed by police corruption, the brutal treatment of the United Friends and Family demonstration in October, the policing of the riots and subsequent mass arrest and criminalisation of London black youth:  all these issues have contributed to a real haemorrhaging of trust and confidence in the police service.

This brutal and awful reality of this terrible state of affairs for a multicultural city like London is the simple truth that the MPS no longer enjoys the trust of many Black Londoners.

Add to this the most recent cases of a 21 year old black man Mauro Demetrio who recorded a police officer calling him a “nigger”, coming on top of all the other issues raised here, it becomes abundantly clear that we are at a crisis point.

None of these issues can be seen in isolation. A criticism of the MPS, made initially by the McPherson report, criticised the MPS for refusing to see the bigger picture in seeking to tackle racism.

The Mayor of London, who is responsible for the MPS after the abolition of the Metropolitan Police Authority, chose not to maintain the whole race equality policy monitoring infrastructure that the MPA had established as a priority.

The announcement of the abolishment of the MPA in the summer of 2010 meant that its’ power and influence on these matters disappeared as the Mayor took increasing control leading up to its official recent abolition.

The signs were always there.  In the foreword of the now largely forgotten and discredited Race and Faith report, after looking at the lack of promotion of black officers, Boris Johnson wrote, “I welcome Cindy Butts’ finding that the Met is not institutionally racist…” The fact was that the Cindy Butts report had concluded no such thing. 

The Mayor in his eagerness to dismiss race simply added that sentence to the report without the agreement or consent of the inquiry panel.

Let’s not forget that Bob Purkiss a member of the initial inquiry team resigned, citing political interference from the Mayor’s Office, who had insisted that the report came to this conclusion despite those responsible refusing to do so. 

As a result the MPS and the Mayor determined that this issue was no longer a priority.

Over the last few years the MPS has surrounded itself with black community advisers that are frightened of their own shadow, leaving them surrounded by people who are the virtual equivalent of nodding dogs.

Where are the public statements of concern or condemnation for the Scotland Yard Independent Advisory Group and Trident IAG? In my view both groups are now being used to legitimise police racism. They need to find the political courage to do the right thing and resign.

Boris’s ideological opposition to race equality led him to prematurely dismiss the reality of institutional racism in the MPS, it blinded him to a growing crisis of confidence and when the crunch came and riots exploded in the streets of the capital he was chasing Bullwinkle in the Rocky Mountains.

Whilst London burned, Boris was asked by a journalist if he intends to return to London. His response and I quote: "I am not going to come back at the moment because I have complete confidence in the police…"

The Commissioner and the new Mayor need to understand the depth and seriousness of this crisis. At the moment they are seeking to downplay and dismiss these concerns.  That is a catastrophic error and they need to wake up to that fact and seek to restructure that relationship by using credible and experienced leadership.

This is urgent because, as he knows, he has a whole slew of similarly appalling cases of police racism and brutality currently in court or under investigation.  

When they appear in the public domain he and the new Mayor better have a clear and credible response.

Lee Jasper

Occupy Faith UK: Peaceful meeting at Royal Courts of Justice this Saturday

Royal Courts of Justice Strand London WC2A 2LL   Nearest Underground Station   Temple. Nearest Underground Station   Temple.     Saturday 7th April at 12.00 - Location: Royal Courts of Justice   All that is required to Occupy is people and places. Across the globe and in the UK the Occupy movement pursues socially progressive solutions to human needs and social justice for the 99% who are the nations least wealthy. We should unite in challenging the system, because if we are complacent, we are complicit in allowing injustice to happen. Faith groups have been sources of moral reasoning and beautiful narrative for thousands of years, own property across the nation, and represent 45 million UK citizens.  In order for the Occupy movement to claim to represent the 99% there needs to be a constructive dialogue with local communities, including faith groups, to develop an understanding of their concerns and seek their assistance in providing solutions. The only way for faith groups to continue to claim to be a source of moral authority, is to open its doors and encourage their members to engage in the good work that Occupy has been doing in highlighting economic and social injustices. Occupy Faith UK are dedicated to combining faith cultures and resistance cultures in support of the Occupy movement to make a joint stand against social & economic injustice, class culture, racism and oppression.  We are planning to gather as a peaceful crowd outside the Royal Courts of Justice at 12.00 on Saturday the 7th April and will have a few speakers and performers, discussing issues of justice in the UK, after which we will chant ohm together. The effect of a mass chant can be pleasant in itself as a meditation, in a healing spirit we will be trying to bring justice to life. This is to show the benefits of coming together as a community. After the chant we hope to have a few musicians and participate in a Scriptural Reasoning on justice. We will also be revealing more about our plans to hold a Pilgrimage for Justice walk from St Paul's to Canterbury Cathedral over the coming summer and this is open to everyone to join us. We are planning to undertake this event from the 7th till the 23rd of June, stopping off at important locations and developing discussions and general assemblies to feed into a conference in Canterbury.  It will take the support of many people to make this work, and we hope to generate some here.  Come and join us, invite your friends, publicise this event via your networks and remember - Everyone is welcome!

Occupy Faith

 

 

Black Economics Conference 2012

For further information go to: http://www.blackeconomics.co.uk/ace.htm

Accelerate Commercial & Economic Growth (ACE)

Saturday, 12 May, 2012

Venue: The Dominion Centre, 9 The Broadway, High Road, Woodgreen, London, N22 6DS

Aim of the Conference:

- To Celebrate Black Entrepreneurship while Inspiring & Motivating Others including Young People
- To Note the Commercial Value of the Black Pound, and where it is going
- Solutions to Accelerate Economic Progress with Business Options & Methods

This event will be a positive day with - Speakers/Debates, Exhibition/Market Place, Teen Workshops,
Business Options for Wealth and a Fashion Show

Boris Johnson & MPS: black communities at crisis point

During the tenure of Boris Johnson and his erstwhile Deputy Kit Malthouse relations between London’s black communities and the Metropolitan Police Service have reached crisis point.

Each day that tension increases as the former Mayor and current Commissioner struggle to find an adequate political and professional response to the huge issues that now face London.

The case of Mauro Demetrio, a 21 yr old black man who recorded the most foul and repugnant racist abuse reminiscent of the 1950’s Deep South Jim Crow racism of Birmingham Alabama, has created a profound sense of anger in black communities.

Birmingham, Alabama desegregation campaign. (Photo: Amistad Digital Resource)

Luckily this brave young man recorded abuse that has anecdotally become increasingly routine over the last four years. The general consensus among black communities is that, had he not had the foresight to record the conversation, the outcome would have been a dismissed police complaint and a charge for some trumped up crime.

More worryingly is the fact that neither the Crown Prosecution Service nor the MPS saw fit to begin criminal or disciplinary proceedings against the officer concerned PC Alex MacFarlane. 

Why for example was not every single officer concerned with this case suspended and interviewed? Any that were aware of what happened are as guilty as MacFarlane. As far as the CPS is concerned the initial decision not to take action was disgraceful and immediate action should be taken to put disciplinary charges to those who were involved in this ludicrous decision.

The damage to confidence is palpable. How can black people trust that the police are committed to tackling racism when all the evidence points to rampant institutional racism?  We have witnessed coordinated misinformation campaigns smearing the victims of deaths in custody, police and press corruption, black men being tasered and shot, racially abused and black children assaulted?

All this, in the context of little or no justice and no political or professional accountability.

Now we hear of the case of a 15yr old black boy who is said to have been assaulted by PC Joe Harington in the custody area of an east London police station, the very same one that the arrested Mauro Demetrio was taken to.

This reveals a pervasive culture of institutional racism that has been unrestrained and given a green light by Boris Johnson. His personal failure to recognise and accept in policy terms the reality of multicultural London has been tragic.

He has failed to tackle gun and knife crime, failed to deliver his much vaunted Mayoral Fund, failed to implement his proposals on a mentoring scheme over the last 2 years, despite lots of warnings that relations with the police were in total meltdown. Stop and search rates have increased by 300% over the last four years and suspicious deaths in custody by a 100%.

Boris Johnson’s abysmal failure to recognise what was in plain sight, meant he did not recognise the potential significance of the shooting of Mark Duggan in Tottenham last year despite being warned time and time again. The riots were entirely preventable and swift and effective intervention by the Mayors’ Office and the MPS was essential. Both made a critical series of errors that demonstrated just how out of touch Boris, Kit and the Commissioner were.



Photo: The Guardian

Their collective failures to understand, be in touch with and maintain effective communication with London’s black community, along with the Mayors ideological blind spot on race, resulted in him dismissing as politically motivated those critical voices, like mine, who predicted the riot some months earlier.

That critical error by the Mayor to invest time and resources in addressing black communities’ concerns allowed anger to build. Unbelievably, once the announcement that the Metropolitan Police Authority was being disbanded, all of the policy monitoring infrastructure related to the Stephen Lawrence Inquiry recommendations were abolished.

There was a clear absence of political pressure on the MPS to tackle racism. Johnson went so far as to say at the publication of the controversial Race and Faith Report that the MPS was no longer ‘institutionally racist’.

I put these points to Deputy Mayor Kit Malthouse at one of his recent community consultations: his view was that he did not recognise my analysis of the situation. He told me that police community relations were nowhere near as bad as I described. He advised me to speak to the Black Police Association who would tell me the ‘good things we are doing’. I did speak with them and they agreed with me that relations were in a parlous state.

Commissioner Hogan Howe (Photo: Guardian.)

I asked the same of Commissioner Hogan Howe a few weeks ago during an online Q&A session. He responded by saying that he disagreed with my view and relations although difficult, were not strained. These comments illustrate what happens when there is strategic political failure to grasp the importance of race equality policy and anti racist leadership.

For a multicultural and diverse city like London, the failure to understand and be in touch with all sections of London’s communities is absolutely vital. Johnson’s failure in this regard has been monumental. He has single handedly degraded policing race policy priorities and police and black community relations, destroying years of progress made.  Today any gains made have been pushed back and the issues that informed them inflamed and regressed. This acute political failure has cost London and the country dear and I fear things are about to get much worse after these recent incidents.

Lee Jasper

Multiculturality: a truth that dare not speak it's name

The backlash of global racism.

Racism in the western world is on the rise. Yes there are tracts of academia I could quote you to follow the tiresome conventions justifying and giving credence to such comments, but I’m going to resist that temptation. Those who oppose the real reality of racism do not do so because of a lack of facts, they do so because a lack of reason. Partly it’s a consequence of the psychological dissonance that personal prejudice relies upon and it partly derives from an ideological extreme right wing or right of centre liberal, political perspective that purposely designates racism as nothing more than a historical relic.

Here I am reminded of the words of the late 19^th century Scottish Poet Andrew Lang who is quoted of saying of a rival with whom he disagreed, “He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lamp-posts: for support rather than illumination.”

 For so called post racist societies such as Britain and America (where the right wing deems the legitimate claims of racism, as representing nothing more than the inflated claims of a few uppity black people with chips on their shoulders), racism is on the rise. The facts, should you care to avail yourself of them, are plain to see and the internal radar that is built into black people’s DNA is registering the rise of racism.

Racial attacks, police racism, political marginalisation and economic exclusion (always real problems for our communities) are now reaching unprecedented levels.

The backdrop to this rise is of course the global financial crash. All history teaches us that when the economy declines racism rises. Scapegoating is that most ignoble bastion of politically wretched scoundrels whose careers must be maintained at any price. Such naked exploitation feeds and promotes peoples growing and genuine anxiety seeking to pin the blame for the economic ills of the nation on hoodies and hijabs instead of the real villains of the piece: bankers and politicians.  Neither is this trend confined to Britain. Evidence can be found of the rise of racism across the world in particular Europe, America, North Africa and Australia.

Trayvon Martin shot dead in America by a white vigilante, George Zimmerman, who was sent home (facing no charges!) to enjoy dinner with his family.


 Mark Duggan was shot dead by the UK police and we now know that there is a danger that his inquest is likely to be held in secret behind closed doors. 

 TJ Hickey a 17 year old black boy form Australia who was rammed by a police car, impaled on a fence and subsequently died with no one held to account. Post Libya Africans are the enemy, in Italy, Africans are lynched and hounded, and in Russia and Germany the vilest fascist organisations are murdering back people whilst police and the authorities collude with racist killers.

In a city like London, such wilful ignorance of racism comes at some enormous cost. Former Mayor Boris Johnson’s schoolboy persona and comedic disposition was no joke for black people. His failure, and this was very much a personal failure, was his inability to see through his own parties’ folly and understand the powerful reality of race and racism in one of the most diverse cities in the world.

Boris: the joke is over

This elite contempt for multiculturalism starts at the Prime Ministers Office and has spread throughout Government departments and local authorities at an alarming rate. 

The gains that were made post the death of Stephen Lawrence and the seminal McPherson report have all but been degraded over the last four years. Britain has returned to its historically defined culturally racist default setting that comes to the fore at all such times of great economic crisis, and that has given a green light to “institutional racism”.

1970’s saw the rise of the National Front and the hated SUS laws. 1980’s saw the rise of Thatcher, black unemployment and police brutality giving rise to civil disturbances. The 1990’s saw the rise of racist murders such as that of Stephen Lawrence, increased rate in deaths in police custody and the emergence of the BNP. This recession is on a scale that dwarfs previous recessions and has lead to unprecedented levels of racism

Like any disease or infection, failure to eradicate the virus can result in a resurgent infection that is usually much worse than the initial illness.

Racism and racial disadvantage, now even more powerful refracted through the lens of austerity, have become toxic of late. Black communities are reeling from a succession of policies that will promote racism and inequality. In this intolerant political culture all social and economic consequences of policy are ignored and race considerations are now an anathema for many working in the civil service and local authorities. The job of imposing these cuts has provided economic cover for ideological racism and its running dog:  institutional racism.

The very basis of our continued existence as a black community in Britain is at stake; such is the ferocity of the backlash.  The stakes are incredibly high, leading to the adoption of the continental trend of violent racism and democratically elected fascists. We simply cannot allow ourselves to be systematically pushed further down into the economic twilight zone and social chaos that increased rates of racism. To do so would be an abdication of our historic responsibility and the results would be that we bequeath to our children a society where racism is on the rise. That is not an option any community in British society can entertain without enormous cost. 

 Lee Jasper

Calls of justice for Trayvon Martin - video & article (by NECN: Brendan Monahan)

Watch video at: http://www.necn.com/03/31/12/Calls-of-justice-for-Trayvon-Martin/landing_nation.html?blockID=680746&feedID=4207

Protest outside the American Embassy, London UK (Photo by Dee Constantine-Simms)

It's a movement growing in strength and numbers.


Thousands carried signs and chanted in Sanford, Fla. on Saturday. They're demanding that police arrest the neighborhood watch volunteer who allegedly shot and killed Florida teen Trayvon Martin last month.


"In many ways, Trayvon's death was a kind of wake up call to pull the cover off a deep and growing body of racist practices in our country," Reverend Jesse Jackson said.


The alleged shooter, George Zimmerman, claims that an unarmed Martin attacked him and that he was acting in self defense. It's a story Martin's family doesn't believe, and neither do top American civil rights leaders, who spoke about racial profiling in America on Saturday.


"Shooting an innocent, unarmed young man is trouble. We are not the trouble makers. We're the trouble breakers. You act like killing innocent children is not trouble," Rev. Al Sharpton said. "You act like we are not going to rise up and stand together. If you shoot us in Sanford, it hits us in Harlem, it hits us in Chicago, it hits us in L.A.! We will stand together!"


The movement has spread across the world. Dozens held signs that read "No Justice, No Peace" outside the United States embassy in England.


"We're sending our solidarity to the States, and we're sending our message to the police and the government," Lee Jasper, a protester, said. "We're not taking this license to kill our people, we're here on the streets making our voice heard."


Trayvon was wearing a hoodie sweatshirt when he was gunned down, and it has become a rallying symbol for supporters everywhere, including in New England. In Springfield, Mass., people took part in an event called "1000 Hoodies: A Walk in Honor of Trayvon Martin." Those at Saturday's rallies say they'll keep the rallies going until Zimmerman is charged.


Despite no charges thus far in the case, authorities continue to investigate the shooting.

Brendan Monahan
http://www.necn.com/