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| Britain |
| MP mix-up as wrong David Davies accuses National Black Police Association of racism |
| 2008-10-30 |
| Members of the National Black Police Association (NBPA) probably did not expect the keynote speaker at their annual conference to suggest the organisation might be guilty of racism. But that's what happened when an invitation mix-up led to the wrong MP addressing the event. Instead of the former shadow home secretary David Davis, his near namesake David Davies, the Tory MP for Monmouth, was invited - and delivered a highly critical speech. Davies said the body's policy of only allowing ethnic minorities to have full membership could be considered "explicitly racist". He said the NBPA - which is backing and funding the Metropolitan police assistant commissioner, Tarique Ghaffur, in his race discrimination case against the force, should "check the truth" of discrimination claims before going to court. The Tory claimed it was "human nature" for people to blame race rather than lack of talent when rejected for promotion, the Public Servant Daily reported. "To me, it is a shame that full membership of the NBPA is open only to those of black, Asian or Middle Eastern origin," he told the conference in York. "Tackling racism and unfair treatment of ethnic minorities is something which is taken seriously by members of every race in the police force, and yet the clear implication is that white people do not share this concern. "It could be argued that this policy is explicitly racist, in that it bars white people, and implicitly racist in suggesting that white people care less about racism than people of black, Middle Eastern, Asian or African origin." The NBPA general secretary, Stafford Brooks, said: "There was an invitation sent out ... the wrong David Davies turned up." "Clearly, he did say some controversial things and it was quite upsetting for some of our members. But it was a very successful conference as far as we are concerned." |
| Posted by:tipper |
#3 It could have been worse: they could have gotten his brother Ray.
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| Posted by: Eric Jablow 2008-10-30 20:29 |
| #2 This says a lot about said cops ability to arrest the right person, if they can't even ID their keynote speaker correctly. |
| Posted by: Grunter 2008-10-30 08:43 |
| #1 "The Emperor has no clothes!" Fantastic. Cameron, get this man onto the shadow cabinet. |
| Posted by: Bulldog 2008-10-30 03:15 |