Scarman Report - Aftermath

Aftermath

The theme of the Scarman report was broadly welcomed, accepted and endorsed by politicians, police commissioners, the press and community relations officials. Some of the report's recommendations were implemented. "Hard policing" continued and new measures were taken to create greater public trust and confidence in official institutions. Multi-agency and "soft" policing emerged through community consultation, youth and "race relations" services.

The Scarman report pushed the issue of law and order, and specifically policing, onto the mainstream agenda. The debate in the House of Parliament to mark the publication of the Scarman report on the 26 November 1981 had as its theme "law and order" and the then leader of the Liberal Party, David Steel, argued that "urgent action" to prevent a drift into lawlessness was necessary. A subsequent debate on March 1982 referenced the events of 1981 and focused on the impact of street violence, crime, decaying urban conditions, and the danger of "more violence to come" if changes in both police tactics and social policy were not swiftly introduced. While both the Conservative and Labour speakers in the parliamentary debate on the riots accepted the need to support the police, substantial disagreement centred around the issue of what role social deprivation and unemployment had in bringing young people to protest violently on the streets.

As a consequence of the Scarman report a new code for police behaviour was put forward in the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984; and the act also created an independent Police Complaints Authority, established in 1985, to attempt to restore public confidence in the police.