Passenger Profiling Could Alienate Ethnic Groups (Leeds Liberal Democrats)

Leeds Liberal Democrats <info@leedslibdems.org.uk>

Passenger Profiling Could Alienate Ethnic Groups

August 21, 2006 9:48 PM

Liberal Democrat Councillor Kabeer Hussain (Hyde Park and Woodhouse) has spoken out against plans to introduce 'passenger profiling' at British airports. Rather than using resources to hand-search families or businessmen, security officers will target those people that in their opinion are most likely to be terrorists. Cllr Hussain points out that as well as being difficult to implement successfully, such a measure could lead to accusations of racism.

Cllr Kabeer Hussain (Liberal Democrat, Hyde Park & Woodhouse) said "I'm completely in favour of tightening security in order to ensure that we can all travel safely and without fear. Passenger profiling however is based upon what is basically a racist assumption that all people from certain religious backgrounds are the same, and that we all could be potentially terrorists."

"I'm speaking out against this policy for exactly the same reasons that I have already complained about the targeting of certain groups of people for police checks. This policy can only serve to alienate the people being targeted, especially young people."

"In adopting such a simplistic approach, the security forces could actually put people in even greater danger by failing to carry out adequate checks on people who don't match their criteria for being a potential terrorist. There have been plenty of examples of people involved in terrorism who do not fit the stereotype that is portrayed in the media. Passenger profiling would probably have failed to stop the 'shoe bomber' Richard Reid for example, and indeed one of the 24 people arrested last week in connection with the alleged plot to blow up planes was described as 'White British'."