Chief Constable Olivia Pinkney, pictured, apologised after six members of her Serious and Organised Crime Unit in Basingstoke were found to use racist and sexist language
A police force is spending £860,000 on discrimination training for its staff after an investigation revealing shocking racism and sexism in one of its departments.
Up to 6,000 officers at Hampshire Constabulary will receive the ground-breaking training after a full cultural audit of the force is carried out involving teams of university researchers.
The programme is the first accredited equalities and inclusion training in the UK for policing and comes after five officers were dismissed when covert recordings uncovered an array of racist, homophobic and sexist language in a specialist unit.
Olivia Pinkney of Hampshire Police says her force s lack of diversity is not ok
The Chief constable of the force where five officers have been sacked for abhorrent racist language says the police s lack of diversity is not ok .
Olivia Pinkney of Hampshire Police said she is very aware her senior leadership team team look the way they do and admitted she is concerned by the overall whiteness of the force.
The highest ranking officer from a minority background in the county is a chief inspector.
She said: [It] is a concern. If we look at the Chief Officer group of this constabulary, we are half female and have all sorts of other diverse characteristics - but we are all white.
Updated photos of the Police Investigation Centre, Basingstoke..March 22nd 2017.Photography by Sarah Gaunt taken 22.03.17. MEMBERS of a police unit who have been branded as demonstrating “shameful” behaviour have been dismissed from the service after they were covertly recorded making ‘offensive and disrespectful’ remarks. Six officers at Hampshire Constabulary’s Serious Organised Crime Unit (SOCU) based at the Northern Police Investigation Centre, in Basingstoke, were found guilty of gross misconduct after they were recorded using ‘racist, sexist and homophobic’ language. Today, following a lengthy misconduct hearing, five of the six officers were dismissed from the force without notice for breaching the Standards of Professional Behaviour.
Detective Inspector Timothy ireson (Credit: Solent News and Photo Agency) THE commanding officer of a toxic specialist police unit accepts that his failings of management helped lead to the discriminatory atmosphere that developed amongst his officers, a tribunal has heard. Six police officers could face the sack after being found to have committed gross misconduct after they were recorded making abhorrent comments while working at Hampshire police s Serious Organised Crime Unit (SOCU) office in Basingstoke. The officers were recorded by a bugging device making abhorrent racist, sexist, homophobic and other inappropriate comments. Retired Detective Inspector Tim Ireson, Detective Sergeant Oliver Lage, Detective Sergeant Gregory Willcox, former PC Craig Bannerman, trainee Detective Constable Andrew Ferguson and PC James Oldfield have all been found to have breached professional standards at a disciplinary hearing.