Police stop-and-search data is needed to account for equality | Michael Shiner and Rebekah Delsol
Axing proper records of stop-and-search won't save police much time. But it will lose them trust Tomorrow, when parliament debates the government's proposal to drastically cut the police recording of stop-and-searches , MPs should make sure they've got their calculators with them. Nick Herbert, minister for policing and criminal justice, claims that cutting the recording of stop-and-search and stop-and-account will save a total of 750,000 hours of police time a year. This conjures up visions of officers, freed of red tape, getting on with the real job of fighting crime. But the figures don't add up. On average, officers conduct two recorded stop-and-searches or stop-and-accounts a month. The government claims each recording averages 15 minutes, so even on its figures the proposed changes would save an officer just half an hour a month. But our estimates suggest a figure of less than half this. In addition, more and more forces are already cutting paperwork by introducin...
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