'Protest panel' to aid policing of Rotherham marches

The advisory group will comment on South Yorkshire Police proposals before and after demonstrations.

Police commissioner Dr Alan Billings called for the review after the trouble outside the William Fry pub on September 5 following the Britain First (BF) and counter protests.

The report — Towards A New Approach — said: “It appears from our conversations with police officers and others, that policing resources had not been made available for that location.”

Nineteen men were charged with violent disorder after the protests last September. 

Dr Billings accepted the recommendations, which also included having public observers — protected by police — present at future marches.

Report authors Andrew Lockley and Imam Mohammad Ismail, from the PCC’s independent ethics panel, said there had been a failure to appreciate heightened tensions among Rotherham’s Muslim population after the murder of Mushin Ahmed.

Their report said: “Police did not appear to anticipate until late on, that the numbers who would turn out to oppose BF would be both greater than on previous occasions of far right marches, and from a much wider cross-section of the community.”

The September 5 demo was the 14th protest in Rotherham since October 2012, at a policing cost of £4 million.

The review also flagged up difficulties calling the police for people whose first language is not English.

The 101 non-emergency number is currently the subject of a separate PCC review.