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I was a copper from 1962 serving in London. Stop & search was never resented by the community who accepted it as part of life and why it was necessary. A lot of major crime was solved by it. The police were the Sheriff & you didn't give them hassle. Normal people never saw the inside of a police station unless wanting help. So the majority were never inconvenienced providing that we politely co-operated with police. Who wants a police force that can be shouted at and abused anyway?

We failed to explain this to the waive of immigrants that were brought over in those day that 'that's what we do and how we work & that when in Rome' Instead what we did was lower our disciplines to suit the complaints. We should have explained it better. We failed to do that.

Of course it is discriminatory. It's like fishing. The skipper goes where, from experience, he thinks the fish are likely to be. For example: If knife crime is known to be predominant among a certain type then that's where to look for knives.

Most complaints about stop and search is because it works in reality.