‘Two-tier’ policing, misinformation and far-right riots, fact-checked ...Middle East

Police were unprepared for the scale of disorder that erupted during the summer riots and failed to clamp down on misinformation that helped them spread, a watchdog has claimed.

A review into the response of police to the riots sparked by the Southport knife attacks found that while officers “displayed immense bravery in the face of extreme violence”, they failed to recognise the significance of events leading up to the riots and were slow to mobilise after disorder broke out.

In September, His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services (HMICFRS) was tasked with carrying out a review into the police response to the worst UK unrest in more than a decade.

Chief Inspector of Constabulary Andy Cooke warned that another wave of “serious disorder” was likely in the next years with “far more tensions across communities and far more ways of sharing information”, unless policing steps up to “counter disinformation and misinformation”.

Here, we fact-check some of the core claims surrounding the policing of the riots.

Verdict: True

The report found that police intelligence did not predict the “rising tide of violent disorder well enough”, meaning that opportunities to prepare for and clamp down on disorder were missed.

It found that several events in 2023 and 2024 were indicators of potential future disorder, but that this had not been reflected in police intelligence assessments.

It said: “Our assessment of these incidents suggests that the risks of disorder were greater than the police believed them to be. They involved extreme nationalist sentiment, aggravated activism or serious disorder.

“All of them took place before the Southport killings and subsequent outbreaks of widespread disorder across the UK.”

Some of the incidents noted include disorder near asylum seeker hotels in Merseyside and Rotherham in February 2023; violence in November as protesters clashed during Armistice Day in London; and unrest during Tommy Robinson demonstrations including 100,000 people attending a rally in London just two days before the riots.

A flood of misinformation about the Southport attack was spread on numerous social media platforms igniting riots across the UK (Photo: Christopher Furlong/Getty)

Fact check: Police operated ‘two-tier’ system during riot investigations

Verdict: False

Far-right conspiracy theorists and figures such as Reform UK leader Nigel Farage have accused the police of “two-tier policing” in response to the riots, claiming the BLM demonstrations in 2020 and Pro-Palestinian protests this year were policed “more favourably”.

The report found “no evidence whatsoever” of two-tier policing, Cooke said, adding that comments like those of Farage “do nothing” to ensure police “can keep communities safe”.

He told Times Radio that the Southport riots were “policed differently” to other protests as they were “violent disorder”.

“Officers were for hours and hours subjected to missile attacks, to physical attacks, to petrol bombs, you name it, anything that could be thrown at the police was thrown at the police, resulting, as I say, in a lot of injuries.

“This wasn’t a protest where a few people were acting against the law. This was violent disorder. This was an attempt to injure police officers.”

Verdict: True

The report found that police failed to tackle the misinformation and disinformation that ignited the riots.

Cooke said: “There were gaps in their intelligence functions, especially around the analysis of social media and other dark web media, and no one understood or could counter the emerging cause and effect of that misinformation and disinformation.

“So the police failed adequately to denounce it or mitigate against it in real time to deter or curtail the disorder.”

Police officers disperse a counter-gathering ahead of an anti-immigration protest by far-right activists, outside the Waltham Forest Immigration Bureau offices in Walthamstow (Photo: Benjamin Cremel/AFP)

Fact check: Farage posted bogus claim about authorities ‘hiding details’ about Southport killings

Verdict: True

The day after the Southport stabbings Farage posted a video on X in which he questioned “whether the truth is being withheld from us”, as rumours about the identity of the attacker spread online.

He also claimed the attacker may have been on the security services’ watch-list.

His comments sparked widespread condemnation. Neil Basu, a former Scotland Yard officer in charge of counter-terrorism, said Farage was “undermining the police, creating conspiracy theories, and giving a false basis for the attacks on the police”.

Farage defended his comments saying, “I think it’s perfectly reasonable to ask what is happening to law and order in our country”.

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