Metropolitan Police: Strip-search of Schoolgirl

Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi Excerpts

Monday 21st March 2022 Commons Chamber

[Kit Malthouse]

I think that is grossly unfair when the hon. Lady knows that I am bound by due process not to comment on an ongoing investigation by the IOPC. When that investigation is concluded we will have plenty to say, fear not. I have spent lots of time dealing with crime and social policy issues in the capital so I am sensitised to the issues the hon. Lady raises; I do recognise them and have done, I like to think, quite a lot of work on them in the past.

[Mr Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Slough) (Lab)]

The shocking, scandalous strip-search of child Q is so demeaning; how could those Met police officers and the school have thought that such a horrible action could be even remotely acceptable? This could have happened to any one of our children—or could it? I ask that because the statistics tell a very different story, and indeed the safeguarding review revealed that racism could well have been an influencing factor in the decisions taken. Given that, what is the Minister doing to urgently take action on this?

[Kit Malthouse]

I refer the hon. Gentleman to the answers I gave earlier, and we will know these things when the IOPC concludes, which I hope it will shortly.