Downing Street Says » Stop and search

» Wednesday, March 2, 2005

Stop and search

Asked if the Prime Minister was happy with the message given out to British Muslims yesterday by Hazel Blears the PMOS said that you had to be clear about what it was that Hazel Blears had been saying which was that she understood if there was a perception that stop and search powers were aimed at one particular community but that was not what was happening. What was happening was that those powers were aimed at those who were suspected of carrying out or planning certain activity. They may happen to come from a particular community but it was not a police policy to aim those powers at a particular community. Therefore it was important that people looked at what Hazel Blears had said in the right context and perspective.
Asked when the Prime Minister referred to several hundred potential Islamists engaged in terrorism whether it was right to assume that the majority were not British citizens the PMOS said that was not right and if you considered the case earlier in the week that would indicate that you should not make that generalisation, but he would not get into the detail of who those people were. As he said yesterday what the Prime Minister was reflecting was a group of people who were a concern to the police and the security services but with varying degrees of concern. Therefore he was simply alerting people to the fact and the fact of why we all had to be alert.

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