Suella Braverman's migrants speech like Rivers of Blood, says senior Met officer

Britain’s most senior Asian police officer has compared Suella Braverman’s comments on immigration to Enoch Powell’s infamous Rivers of Blood speech.

Neil Basu, the UK’s former head of counter terrorism, described the Home Secretary’s choice of language on the asylum issue as “inexplicable” and “horrific”.

Ms Braverman came in for criticism when she told the Telegraph she dreamed of sending migrants to Rwanda and also when she described the current crisis as an “invasion”

In an interview ahead of his retirement from the Metropolitan Police, Mr Basu, whose father came to the UK from India in the 1960s, said such language reminded him of the racism his family endured following Powell’s inflammatory speech.

He told Channel 4 News: “I find some of the commentary coming out of the Home Office inexplicable. It is unbelievable to hear a succession of very powerful politicians who look like this, talking in language that my father would have remembered from the 1968. It's horrific.”

Mr Basu - whose father was a doctor who moved to Britain from Calcutta, and whose mother was a nurse from Wales - grew up in Stafford where he was regularly the target of racist abuse.

He described how after Powell’s speech, his parents had stones thrown at them by racists as they walked down the street.

He said: “I was born in 1968. The ‘Rivers of Blood’ speech happened on the constituency next to where my parents lived and made their life hell. A mixed-race couple walking through the streets in the 1960s. Stoned.”

He added: “I speak about race because I know something about race because I'm a 54-year-old mixed race man.”

Ms Braverman, whose own parents came to Britain in the 1960s from Mauritius and Kenya, has been criticised for her rhetoric on the migrant crisis, but has expressed her determination to tackle the issue.

On Tuesday, a Home Office spokesman said the Home Secretary was very clear about the need to “manage our borders effectively and have an asylum system that works for those in genuine need”.

Mr Basu was the country’s head of counter terrorism policing between 2018 and 2021 but missed out on becoming Commissioner and also on being appointed head of the National Crime Agency after clashing with No 10 and Priti Patel, the former home secretary.

One flashpoint came when Mr Basu urged the Home Office to consider relaxing the rules on positive discrimination in order to increase the number of black and ethnic minority police officers.

Mr Basu suggested his progress in policing had been blocked by the Government because he had been outspoken on issues of race and diversity.

But he said he was proud to describe himself as “woke”, defining it as "being alert to issues of racial and social injustice".

“If that is the definition of woke, I'll wear it as a bumper sticker every day of the week. And by the way, every serving police officer, let alone a chief constable, better believe that too." he said.

“We serve all of the public without fear or favour, regardless of who they look like, not just the people we like.”

Mr Basu said diversity and inclusion were two of the most important things for modern policing adding that there should be “zero tolerance” of prejudice in the Met.

Asked whether thousands of police officers needed to be rooted out of the Met, Mr Basu replied: “Yes, I think that's correct. If you're a police officer watching this and you are - like the vast majority of police officers - a good person who wants to do the right thing, then you have to be the person who doesn't walk by when you see that kind of behaviour.”