The legacy of Notting Hill
Amit Roy
Joseph Oliver Louis, a 48-year-old Jamaican London Transport bus cleaner, strode angrily into the North London offices of the Westindian World last week, clutching a small, plastic bag. He opened it with a great sense of drama to pull out a shirt turned rust-coloured with congealed blood. 'No. I am not gonna get rid of this shirt,' he declared defiantly, lowering his head to reveal where his skull had been split open with a police baton at the start of the Notting Hill riots. Louis's story, that he was set upon by police even though he was an innocent bystander, minding a friend's stall, is one of many taken up by the Westindian World, a weekly which circulates widely among Britain's one million blacks. Its regular readers are quite aware that there is no love lost between their paper and the police.
For its part, Scotland Yard has steadfastly refused to advertise for black police in the Westindian World, though it did relent when a new recruiting campaign was launched last October. The £25,000 campaign turned out to be an absolute flop, failing to attract a single additional entrant. Almost any issue of the Westindian World would provide clues to the nature of the
relationship between young blacks and the police, which is essential for an understanding of what went wrong at Notting Hill.
For example, the issue of 8 April, which is a fairly typical one, carried a front page photograph of an agonised black being dragged away by burly policemen, together with an open letter from the paper's extrovert editor, Arif Ali, to Sir Robert Mark, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, who is shown smiling. 'Robert, let's be realistic. wrote the affable Ali. 'How can you expect blacks to join forces with an establishment that is hell bent on crushing a people psychologically and physically. The attitude of your boys was truly reflected in violent clashes such as the Metro Club incident. Mangrove, Brockwell Park, and more recently the Carib Club incident. We suggest that the next £25,000 be spent on a re-education programme of t he en tire police. To these landmarks can now be added the legend of Notting Hill. Nor is Westindian World the only black paper obsessed with the behaviour of the police. Race Today, the militant monthlY, has devoted fhe whole of its current issue to the topic: 'Up against the police'. It detail instances of police harassment or callous. ness, not all of which can be without foundation. This is not to say that the toP echelons at Scotland Yard are not aware of the need for improving relations with black youngsters. But they have gone about it in a peculiar way.
Any goodwill created by the campaign to recruit more black police has been washed away by the statistics presented by the Metropolitan Police to the Commons Select Committee on Race Relations and Immigration. The claim that black people are disproportionately involved in crime was based on the fact that in 1975, out of 103,252 people arrested for indictable crime, 12,640-12 per cent—were black. 'ComPar" ing this figure with the estimated black population of 4.3 per cent', said the police. 'disproportionate involvement is indicated • Which is, of course, disputable. If the police are prejudiced—and black youngsters believe them to be so—then theY are likely to make more black arrests arlY' way. In the celebrated Carib Club case lo 1974, for example, in which police fought a° hour-long battle with blacks in a North London club, all 12 arrested were finallY acquitted. It could be that black youngsters are disproportionately involved in some fornis of crime, but such a conclusion could. be reached only on the basis of conviction figures. These, for some reason best knoWo to the police, are not available.
The essential ingredients of a major confrontation between police and black Youths had existed long before the critical conditions for a riot were reached at Notting Hill. How else could one explain the venom with which black youths, most from outside the area, turned on the police? However, a judicial commission, appointed With narrow terms of reference to establish the 'facts' of the case, is likely to do little Other than vindicate the police. For one thing, there are available large quantities of BBC film, which should help to pin the blame firmly on the black youngsters. But the wider implications also need to be explored if the Commission is to serve any real purpose. Was it, for example, a race riot? Opinion so far seems to be sharply divided, though the best assessment I have heard came from a colleague who observed: It will do until something worse comes along'. The point that the riot was racial Only in so far as it was between white police and black youths has already been made. What has not been said is that the clash was also between two easily identifiable minori ties, even tribes. For the police, with their distinctive uniforms, language, attitudes and innate conservatism are as insular and hostile in the face of an external threat as Young West Indians with their woolly hats and rebellious attitudes. Nevertheless, any attempt made either to scrap the carnival or force it into an enclosed arena, as a result of the riot, should be firmly resisted, for that Would be to rob Notting Hill life of its only distraction. What would be equally wrong Would be to foist on the police blame for the deeper ills of West Indian society.
Bad housing and rising unemployment have undoubtedly contributed to the sense of black despair but at the root of the prob
lem lies the gradual fragmentation of West Indian family life. According to West Indian Concern, the proportion of single parent families in their community has reached a staggering 30-40 per cent, which has inevitably produced a whole generation of unloved children.
Some were brought over from the Caribbean after an absence of up to ten
Years from their parents, who had conse
cl,tlentlY become virtual strangers. Missing Imre has been the cushioning effect of grand Parents or other relations, who could care for the children if the parents had to go out to Work, In Britain, it is usually economic hardship and decrepit housing which force both
Parents to seek employment. Many of their
Children, who for a variety of reasons have been unable to take advantage of English schooling, are left with no option but to run and hunt with the pack. For them there is no hoPe.
'They are a lost cause, man,' was the c_ornment, for example, of the Westindian world's deputy editor, Tony Douglas. lack community workers can help them a but the youngsters we ought to save are the ones coming up at present in the schools and the ones being born now.'
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