Campaigners welcome IOPC’s recognition of adultification as racial bias but say guidelines to address it do not go far enough

The police watchdog for England and Wales has called for urgent measures to stop the “adultification” of black children by officers, but campaigners have said the revised guidelines do not go far enough.

The Independent Office for Police Conduct identified adultification as a racial bias that primarily affects black children as well as other minority ethnic children, where they are seen as more “streetwise”, more “grown up”, less innocent and less vulnerable.