Vox Pops on Black Police Officers

From the collection of

MACE is the strategic lead organisation for screen heritage for the East and West Midlands regions. An independent charity based at University of Lincoln, MACE preserves and makes accessible a collection of more than 100,000 historic moving images representative of the diverse cultures and histories of communities throughout the heart of England from the Lincolnshire coast to the Welsh border.

Vox Pops on Black Police Officers (ATV Today)

Media Archive for Central England
1966-02-08
Sound
3m

Black police officers? What a ridiculous idea! Attitudes from England's colonial past linger on in the Midlands of the 1960s.

Reg Harcourt gauges views from a Midlands street about a then controversial issue: ethnicity within the police force. It may be a surprising fact for modern viewers, but the total number of paid black and Asian police officers in Britain when this was filmed in February 1966 was zero! No matter how outdated and jarring the views may be to modern sensibilities this seemingly disposable news items provides us with a reminder of how far we have travelled.

Mohamet Yusuf Daar joined the Coventry police force on 15 March 1966 becoming, in the language of the day, the first 'coloured police officer'. Daar was born in Kenya of Asian heritage and had previously been an inspector with the police force in Tanganyika (now Tanzania). Norwell Roberts, originally from the Leeward Islands, joined the Metropolitan Police in 1967. Another early trailblazer was Astley Lloyd Blair who was an unpaid special constable in Gloucestershire from January 1964.

Black Britain on Film

Striking, illuminating and sometimes surprising images of black culture, community and characters, spanning over a century of British film and TV.

From some of the earliest appearances at the dawn of the 20th century to groundbreaking postwar documentaries and contemporary features, this collection charts changing attitudes and hidden histories. Here are the trailblazers, the icons, the stereotypes, the controversies. These richly varied films uncover sometimes surprising histories of black culture and community. They tackle troubling issues of race, representation and identity. And they highlight some of the best of black British filmmaking, from the work of pioneers Horace Ové and Menelik Shabazz to later innovators John Akomfrah and Ngozi Onwurah