Chief constable vows to end stop-and-search disparity

Chief Constable Amanda Pearson previously said her force had caused "trauma and harm"

Dorset's chief constable has vowed to end racial disparity over police stop-and-searches.

The gap in search rates for black and white people in the county was the biggest in England and Wales, according to previously-reported government figures.

Black people were nearly 14 times more likely to be stopped than white people, the data suggested.

Chief Constable Amanda Pearson, who previously apologised for "institutional racism" in the force, said she aimed to end the imbalance but gave no target date.

In a BBC interview to mark her first two years in post, she said Dorset was "still an outlier" for stop-and-searches.

She said: "Our focus in Dorset Police now is about reforming the way we do stop-and-search and our ambition is to eliminate that disparity completely.

"It has been coming down but I would expect it to continue to come down.

"We should at some point in the future - and I can't yet predict when that can be - we shouldn't see that disparity in stop-and-search."

Black people in Dorset are nearly 14 times more likely to be searched than white people, according to previous government figures

In the year to March 2023, Dorset had the third lowest rate of stop-and-searches nationally, the government previously reported.

However, the rate for black people was slightly above the national average.

Launching a Race Action Plan in September last year, Ms Pearson said black people in Dorset had suffered "trauma and harm" from "institutional racism" in the force.

They were more likely to be arrested and handcuffed than the rest of the county population, the plan said.

In the interview for BBC Radio Solent, Ms Pearson also said overall crime in the county was continuing to fall, with "1,300 fewer victims over the last year".

However, the chief constable said Dorset Police remained the "second lowest funded force in the country".

She argued the government's funding formula ignored visitor levels and the county's wide geographical spread.