The Met Police Commissioner, Bernard Hogan-Howe, is ordering police in London to use fewer stop and searches as a way of improving relations between police and ethnic minorities.

Ken Hinds, chair of Haringey Stop and Search Monitoring Group and who has been a subject of several stop and searches, says that in his experience, police have been "aggressive and antagonistic" towards people they stop and search.

Better relationships with the community would mean that more intelligence could be put into searches, he said. He told the Today

"What we don't need any longer is racial profiling, because it doesn't work."

Commander Tony Eastaugh, has been charged with overseeing the new approach to stop and search, acknowledged the need to rebuild people's perception of the usefulness of stop and search and said that when they get it right they will have people's "mandate and support" to continue in the community.

But he denied that this was a "knee jerk reaction" to the summer riots but that "the time is right to move on" and improve relations between police and the community.

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