The revelations emerging from West Yorkshire Police and seen by the Telegraph, should concern anyone who believes in fairness.
Whistleblower reports suggest that white British applicants have been quietly squeezed out of entry-level police jobs while ethnic minority candidates were fast-tracked — cheered on by the force’s own diversity teams.
We are told, of course, that this is all in the name of “positive action” — perfectly legal under the Equality Act 2010. Yet there is a fine, often invisible, line between encouraging diversity and rigging the game.
If what has been alleged is accurate — candidates effectively ranked by race, job vacancies hidden from certain groups, interviews treated as a formality — that line has been well and truly crossed.
This is not positive action. It is positive discrimination — unlawful in the UK, and corrosive to the very ideals equality campaigners claim to uphold.
Merit Must Matter
It cannot be right for any public institution — especially a police force — to judge individuals primarily by their ethnic background rather than their abilities.
Policing, perhaps more than any other profession, demands public confidence. Every citizen needs to trust that the officer responding to their call earned their badge through competence and character, not because of a hidden system that prioritised their ethnicity.
The irony is somewhat painful. In the pursuit of fairness, West Yorkshire Police, which is currently promoting on its website its’ Police Race Action Plan, appears to have created a new unfairness — one that tells would-be officers from a white British background that they are not welcome, that they must wait their turn while others are “ushered through.”
This does nothing to foster unity. Instead, it fuels resentment, division and distrust — the very opposite of what a modern police force should aim for.
The Tyranny of Targets
West Yorkshire Police is far from alone in its obsession with “diversity targets.” Across the public sector, “representation” has become a dangerous fetish. It is not enough to ensure that everyone has a fair chance to apply and be assessed on merit. Instead, outcomes must be sculpted, massaged and manipulated until the right number of faces fits the right demographic boxes.
It is unsurprising, then, that WYP reportedly spends £1 million a year on diversity, equality and inclusion staff — more than any other police force in Britain. In this new order, success is measured not by public safety or the quality of policing, but by the percentage points on a diversity spreadsheet.
And woe betide anyone who questions the orthodoxy. The whistleblower who tried to raise concerns was, he claims, warned not to interfere.
A Chilling Climate
This is about more than one force. A wider culture has taken hold where lawful positive action has slipped into positive discrimination — and positive discrimination has become not just tolerated, but quietly celebrated.
The mantra is always the same: we must better reflect the communities we serve. Yet the real community most institutions now serve is not the people who fund and rely on them, but the activists and bureaucrats who patrol the boundaries of acceptable thought.
It should also be considered that many in the “ethnic” community owe their allegiance to Sharia law, and so therefore do not recognise the authority of UK law.
If West Yorkshire Police wishes to attract a broader range of recruits, good. If it wishes to offer additional encouragement or mentorship to those from under-represented groups, fine. But the moment it starts to tilt the scales, the moment it engineers outcomes based on race, it loses the right to call itself fair — and damages the legitimacy of every officer who wears its uniform.
The Way Back
True diversity is about opportunity, not guarantees. It is about allowing anyone — of any background — to compete on a level playing field, in the knowledge that the rules are the same for all.
If we are serious about building police forces that command the confidence of all communities, we must reject this dangerous drift towards race-based recruitment. The British people, of every colour, deserve better.
Main Image: West Yorkshire Police
