London's first black policeman

Witness History

BBC

History, Personal Journals, Society & Culture

4.4 • 1.6K Ratings

🗓️ 4 October 2021

⏱️ 11 minutes

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Summary

Norwell Roberts joined the Metropolitan police in 1967. He was put forward as a symbol of progressive policing amid ongoing tensions between the police and ethnic minorities in the capital. But behind the scenes, Norwell endured years of racist abuse from colleagues within the force. Norwell Roberts spoke to Alex Last about growing up in Britain and his determination to be a pioneer in the police.

(Photo: London's first black policeman PC Norwell Roberts beginning his training with colleagues at Hendon Police College, London, 5 April 1967. Credit: Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

Transcript

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0:00.0	Choosing what to watch night after night the flicking through the endless
0:06.8	searching is a nightmare we want to help you on our brand new podcast off the
0:11.8	telly we share what we've been watching
0:14.0	Cladie Aide.
0:16.0	Load to games, loads of fun, loads of screaming.
0:19.0	Lovely. Off the telly with me Joanna Paige.
0:21.0	And me, Natalie Cassidy, so your evenings can be a little less
0:24.9	searching and a lot more auction listen on BBC sounds. Hello and welcome to the Witness History Podcast from the BBC World Service with me Alex Last.
0:41.0	As part of Black History Month here in the UK, this week we're looking at stories from Black
0:45.6	British history and today we'll hear from Norwell Roberts, who in 1967 became the first Black Polic to join London's metropolitan police.
0:57.0	They asked me, why do you want to join the police force? I said, well, I want to help people, and it's a secure job.
1:03.6	But I had a particularly rough time.
1:06.6	Suppose if people warned me, I may have thought I've had second thoughts about it.
1:10.4	I don't know.
1:11.8	But because no one warned me, I on the job should we say and I came
1:15.3	through it but nobody should be subject to that treatment ever.
1:21.3	Noel Roberts born Noel Gums came to England as a boy from Anguilla in the Caribbean in the
1:27.8	1950s.
1:28.8	He was a child of the Windrush generation, citizens of the British Empire who came to the UK from the
1:34.9	Caribbean to work and rebuild the country after the Second World War, whose arrival was met with
1:41.5	hostility from many.
1:43.1	Probably true to say that any non-white person in Britain
	...

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