THE FIGURES
BME officers it will make others more likely to join.” So what needs to happen? According to the charity Diverse Cymru, the low number of BME women in the forces is particularly disappointing.
A spokeswoman for the charity said: “While there is a small improvement on the 2017 statistics for BME people within Wales’ police forces, there remains a large disparity between the diversity of our populations and the make-up of the people policing us.
“This is particularly disappointing Total BME officers 13 28 13 69 when we look at the low numbers of BME women within our police forces and the very low numbers of BME people in senior roles.
“It’s clear that all Wales’ police forces need to improve on their recruitment methods and must engage directly with people, female as well as male, from BME communities.
“They also need to take an honest look at the reasons why BME police officers aren’t progressing into senior roles and improve the visibility of officers from all backgrounds.” What do the forces say? Julie Brierley, head of training and development at North Wales Police, said: “North Wales Police is committed to fairness and equality across our staff, officers and volunteers. We seek to attract a diverse representation of applicants from our communities.
“We have recruited a Positive Action Officer who will be engaging with a wide range of networks across Wales and beyond to attract and progress more females and people from the black, Asian and minority communities.
“As an organisation we are developing our insight into the factors that attract people into a career in policing and the wide range of roles we have on offer.
“Our Police Constable recruitment campaign starts later this month and our website contains details of current vacancies for police staff roles. We encourage applications from under-represented groups and seek to attract people who may not have previously considered working for the Police Service.”
A spokeswoman for Gwent Police added: “We aim to attract, recruit and retain police officers from a broad range of communities, and offer pro- motion possibilities to all officers in Gwent who show high potential. As part of our current recruitment activities, we have been working closely with our community networks to attract applications from communities who may not traditionally apply.
“We have a range of initiatives in place to support candidates from under-represented groups through the recruitment process.
“Policing is dependent on building public trust and confidence, and ensuring our workforce is representative of the communities we serve is integral to this.
“This is a gradual, often complex process which is impacted by a range of factors. We are pleased that we have increased our BAME representation over the last few years, with our officer intakes now averaging around 5% BAME new starters.”