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Riots in the 20th century

Immigration and race

Because of growing international trade in the 18th and 19th centuries, there were increasingly large groups of people living in British port cities who were from Africa and Asia. Sometimes these immigrant communities were targeted and attacked.

For example, at the end of the First World War there was a lot of unemployment in some industries as large numbers of men returned home from fighting in France. Sailors found it very difficult to get work, and many blamed immigrants for ‘taking away their jobs’ and making it more difficult for them to get houses. As a result, black sailors were attacked in 1919 in various UK port cities including Cardiff, Glasgow and Liverpool.

Following the Second World War, people from the Caribbean were encouraged to live and work in the UK. In June 1948 the Empire Windrush ship docked at Tilbury, near London, with 492 Caribbean passengers on board and more people arrived over the following years. Poor white youths felt threatened by the new arrivals, and in August 1958 rioting broke out. More than 300 white youths, many of them the so-called Teddy Boys, attacked West Indian residences in the Notting Hill area of London. Over 140 people were arrested during the two weeks of disturbances.

Hostility between civilians and the police

The police were given the power to stop and search people they suspected of intending to commit an arrestable offence in the 1824 Vagrancy Act. The police often used this power, disproportionally against young men from immigrant communities, far more than they used them against white British people. During this time, using statistics to prove discrimination was difficult as records of this activity were not kept.

The Times newspaper reported on 16 April 1973 that:

“The Metropolitan Police… stated last week that no statistics were kept on searches because none were requested by the home secretary and the commissioner of police did not feel that they were of sufficient interest or importance.”

This led to increasing tensions between these communities and the police throughout the 1970s and beyond.

Riots in the 1980s

There were a number of riots in 1981. Most of these riots occurred in areas of deprivation, such as Brixton, in London, and Toxteth, in Liverpool, at a time when there was high unemployment, racial tensions and, in many places, the relationship between police and the black population was poor.

In Brixton, rumours of police brutality against a black man led to protestors confronting the police. After an arrest took place, fighting took place between protestors and the Metropolitan police. Riots first broke out in London but then quickly spread to many cities across England such as Liverpool, Leeds and Manchester.

2011 riots

A series of riots occurred in 2011. These started in Tottenham Hale in London after a black man named Mark Duggan was shot dead by the police during an operation to arrest him. After the shooting an initial protest occurred outside Tottenham Police Station. Following these events, rioting, disorder and looting occurred which spread to other districts of London and then to other towns and cities across the UK, including Birmingham, Bristol and Manchester.

In a report reviewing the disorder, issued in 2011, Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary described the impacts of the riots:

“The damage caused by four days of disorder was devastating. Five people lost their lives; more than 300 police officers were injured; 2,584 commercial premises were targeted and attacked; wholesale ransacking destroyed entire shopping areas; and at least 231 crimes against domestic properties were recorded across the 10 forces most affected by the disorder, with many families needing to be rehoused. The financial costs of the disorder (while still not formally established) are also very high, with estimates of Riot Act damages reported to range between £200 and £300 million… to say nothing of the loss to business and the reputational damage to the country.”