BAPA history booklet

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As one of the original members of BAPA she recalls initial meetings being poorly attended, with many not wanting to go for fear of reprisals. Even when meetings were held across the force area there were not many staff who were confident enough to attend. Althea eventually left WMP after almost 34 years with the force. Althea Rhodd Also in 1976, Kirk Dawes joined West Midlands Police. He served as a Detective Constable in a number of specialist roles across the Robbery Squad, Special Patrol Group and eventually the Drug Squad. After the publication of the McPherson report into the racially motivated murder of Stephen Lawrence in 1993, Kirk moved into training other CID officers in issues of racial diversity issues. He became the WMBAPA Chair in 1998 and unfortunately had to leave policing in 2004 due to a lung condition. 1982 – Mohammed Khalid Kiyani joined in 1982 to make a difference in the community. He experienced many difficulties as a practicing Muslim. Neither the training centre nor the police service catered for dietary or religious needs of Muslims. He experienced many incidents of racism and discrimination from both within the organisation and from the members of the public. He felt that he and many other BME officers had to develop coping mechanisms in order to survive. He always wanted to affect change from within and he was one of a group of Asian officers who used to get together informally. The suggestion of setting up a formal group to support BME colleagues, from this group, was met with swift negative response from senior officers. At that time there was no appetite to tolerate any such organisation and the idea was put to rest until the later work of the Metropolitan Black Police Association became known in the mid-1990s. He was subsequently one of the founder members of West Midlands Police Black Police Association and he suggested the initial name change to be more inclusive to Asian officers, which was later adopted, leading to the WMP Black and Asian Police Association. Kirk Dawes 18
The Future is Bright – the Future is BAPA Celebrating 50 Years of Black and Ethnic Minority Officers in the West Midlands and 20 Years of West Midlands Police Black and Asian Police Association He worked in the recruitment department in 1985 and was part of a very successful recruiting campaign for WMP to increase the BME officer numbers. He also worked on many force committees and working groups to help bring about many changes internally and externally. Despite experiencing prejudice, racism and discrimination in the service from some people, he has also had the pleasure of working with some very fair-minded, committed and forward thinking people who helped to develop him at a professional level to work in various specialist areas and achieve promotion. Although he worked as a Temporary Detective Chief Inspector in Force CID for 18 months, his biggest regret was not getting through to higher ranks in order to make a bigger difference in influencing policing decisions that affect the communities. Despite all the difficulties, he does however feel a huge sense of satisfaction from the work he did, in particular that what he and fellow early BME officers went through was worth it to pave the way for new and future BME officers to follow. He states that it has been a pleasure to serve the diverse communities of West Midlands. There is no other job in the world that gives you such an experience in life and would recommend it to any young person thinking of joining the Police. Temporary Chief Inspector Mohammed Khalid Kiyani before his retirement Marcia Ore (nee Edwards) also joined the force in 1982. She was influenced by the 1981 Brixton riots and the recommendations in the Scarman report, and didn’t want to go into a stereotypical job of nursing, office or factory work. She promptly gave up her A levels, quit college and signed up. She recalls her early years being very challenging and the support of one BME officer in particular motivated her to keep going. That officer was Judy Clements (now OBE) who has since had a distinguished civil service career after spending 10 years with West Midlands Police. Marcia recalls that in the very early days, black officers felt they couldn’t even acknowledge each other in the corridor, because it started conversations that they were getting together and conspiring. One event in particular has been recounted – where a few BME officers decided to go out socially together for a curry and personal letters were sent to officers to invite them. Senior officers became aware and it suddenly blew up into a massive incident with several officers being told off and deemed ‘troublemakers’. 19
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