Not Much Cop

Police recruitment slated after it’s revealed only 253 officers are of BAME background

- John Ferguson 

Just 253 of Police Scotland’s 17,693 officers are from BAME backgrounds, the force has admitted.

The figures – released in response to a Sunday Mail enquiry – show a tiny 1.4 per cent come from the black, Asian and minority ethnic community compared with 86 per cent who are “white British”.

The last census carried out in Scotland in 2011 found four per cent of the population were from ethnic minority groups, with the figure likely to have increased over the past nine years.

Police Scotland also revealed none of its executive team of senior officers are from the BAME community.

Labour’s justice spokesman James Kelly MSP said: “The under-representation of BAME people is unacceptable and it is very troubling to hear that not a single member of the executive team is from a BAME background.