Former Met Chief Calls for Review of Non-Crime Hate Incidents

A former Metropolitan Police Commissioner has urged Ministers to review the use of non-crime hate incidents in the wake of the investigation into journalist Allison Pearson. The Telegraph has the story.

A new report, published on Monday by the Policy Exchange think tank, urges ministers to abolish the recording of the incidents by police after finding they take up 60,000 hours of officers’ time every year and distract them from fighting crime.

In response, Lord Hogan-Howe said the Government should study the report and consider whether police should be investigating the incidents at all.

His comments come after a row sparked by the investigation into Allison Pearson.

The award-winning Telegraph journalist was visited by Essex Police officers at her home on Remembrance Sunday, who told her she was being investigated for inciting racial hatred with a post on social media from a year before. The force later dropped the investigation.

While Pearson was being investigated for a crime, it prompted widespread scrutiny and criticism of non-crime hate incidents, which do not meet the criminal threshold but are recorded by police.

Lord Hogan-Howe is the most senior policing figure to criticise non-crime hate incidents.

He said the original aim to log incidents that could lead to racist attacks after the murder of Stephen Lawrence was “well-intentioned”, but the way the rules had been introduced had led to “little debate about their efficacy”.

The Peer said police had no powers to investigate or interview “suspects” in non-crime hate incidents, which meant it had caused public concern when officers had done so.

Worth reading in full.

Stop Press: In the Brussels Signal, Laurie Wastell says Britain’s “censorious elites will regret going to war with Elon Musk”, who is also being targeted under Britain’s draconian ‘hate speech’ censorship regime.

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Pete Rose
Pete Rose
1 year ago

60,000 hours annually? The College of Policing has a lot to answer for.

Jack the dog
Jack the dog
1 year ago

No review necessary.

Just stop.

Idiot.

Mogwai
1 year ago

I’m still not sure if this is parody or not but it hasn’t been community noted yet, and given the current climate it’s probably real. Legit criminals must be having a field day knowing all the police are busy doing this sort of nonsense;

”Britain’s slide into communist tyranny continues as a man who called his ex a ‘cheating c**t’ on social media years ago had a call from Starmer’s Stasi.”

https://x.com/darrengrimes_/status/1861406390247461334

This man nails it;

https://x.com/HoodedClaw1974/status/1861403585105322162

Heretic
Heretic
1 year ago

Well done to Lord Hogan-Howe for openly criticising this. His final statement here is shocking:

The Peer said police had no powers to investigate or interview “suspects” in non-hate crime incidents, which meant it had caused public concern when officers had done so.”

Doesn’t that mean the police had NO POWERS and NO RIGHT to disturb Allison Pearson at home on Remembrance Sunday morning, nor to investigate her at all?

Nor to summon her to an interview?

Nor to investigate, arrest, interview or summon anyone suspected of such non-crimes?

Nor to jail them?

This shocking truth needs to be widely publicised, as it illustrates the Marxist Common Purpose “Leadership Training” courses exposed by UK Column’s founder, retired Royal Navy Lt. Commander Brian Gerrish, who said Tory Civil Servants on these courses were taught to “Go Beyond Authority”.

soundofreason
soundofreason
1 year ago
Reply to  Heretic

Allison Pearson was being investigated on suspicion of an actual crime. So it did not fall into the NCHI category. She was mistaken (or fibbing) when she said it was an NCHI. However, the fact that the investigation was then dropped suggests they concluded it was non-crime… and that means… my brain hurts.

The obvious answer if TPTB want NCHIs recorded but the plod are not to waste their time on these things and they do not have the authority to investigate non-crimes anyway is to have some other group doing the recording – and making sure they observe all the PII rules into the bargain. Setting up such a group should only cost £22bn or so. It would also keep the lefties in employment.

transmissionofflame
1 year ago
Reply to  soundofreason

My understanding is that whatever you are suspected of or being investigated for, the police have no power to force you to speak to them. If they have enough grounds they can arrest you, but even then you’re not obliged to say anything, other than perhaps to confirm your name.

Heretic
Heretic
1 year ago
Reply to  soundofreason

“An actual crime”, you say?????? Who did she harm?
And you call her a liar, to boot!

INSULTS ARE NOT A CRIME.

FREEDOM OF SPEECH IS NOT A CRIME.

RACISM=TRIBALISM IS NOT A CRIME.

Who made the races? Almighty God made them, and never told us to mix them all together, or to punish anyone who refused.

HATRED IS NOT A CRIME.

Hatred is a NATURAL HUMAN EMOTION, GIVEN TO US BY ALMIGHTY GOD.

You, whose Pakistani Muslim father came to Britain from Pakistan, after previously Indian Pakistanis rioted and killed their fellow Indians to force the British to carve out a huge chunk of Indian territory to give to your Muslim people, ought to know these things.

soundofreason
soundofreason
1 year ago
Reply to  Heretic

Wow! Plod were investigating something they thought might be a crime – not a NCHI. If they had concluded that it was a crime they’d have probably arrested her as a suspect and maybe CPS would have allowed her to be charged. The point was that the plod didn’t think it was an NCHI they thought she might be guilty of a crime. She wasn’t guilty as we all agree (including plod, now) that there was no crime.

Hatred is not a crime. Totally agree. But it is best to be avoided as it is destructive. But as we do at least seem to agree, what Allison posted was not an example of hatred.

Lastly, you seem to have added two and two and made five. What makes you think my father was Muslim?

Grim Ace
Grim Ace
1 year ago

Non Crime Hate Incidents are Orwellian thought crimes invented and pushed by communist police. Sack them all. Lazy, over feminised, stasi twats