Allowing a police officer with a political/religious conscience to be excused from an assignment where he felt “uncomfortable” may be seen as very generous of the Met.
All citizens 
have personal views, but have to continue working professionally and keep them in check. If you are unable to do so, you are obviously not suited to the job. Mostly, in the UK, British people are not passionate about religion or politics.
But Pc Alexander Omar, a Muslim police officer in his late 20s, obviously was, and owned up to it, which resulted in him being excused from guarding the Israeli embassy in London on moral grounds as he objected to Israeli bombings in Lebanon. He has also taken part in recent anti-war protests, so he clearly has very strong views on this.
On the one hand, he did the right thing in being honest, and he is probably a great cop in other areas. Unfortunately, as a result, he could now find his position severely compromised, his weakness has been widely exposed which could lose him credibility, even taunts and racial abuse.
Surely if he is attached to Scotland Yard’s Diplomatic Protection Group, he would have been strictly vetted to ensure he had no prejudices or discrimination that would have interfered with his duties.
I can’t see the Met making a habit of this, they would expect their officers to rise above personal feelings and put their duty first, that is what the British public expects and we cannot lose sight of that. We need to know our coppers are tough and brave and resilient and true to serving us at all times.
Will vegetarian officers be excused from attending robberies at butchers? Will Jewish officers be excused from guarding Arab embassies?
In my old firm, there were certain clients that each of us working there had been “hassled” by yet we did not have the luxury of being excused from talking to them.
“He did the right thing in being honest.” Ellee, you’ve gone mad – this is the police after all. Police officers should keep their politics to themselves. I have to do plenty of things I don’t like – such as cell watches on revolting suicidal men who take off their clothes and roar at me. Or strip-searching drunk and disgusting females who have soiled themselves. I object to this on moral grounds but I just get on with it. I wonder if the PC’s objection was genuinely that he felt “unsafe” (when did you last hear of a PC being gunned down by extremists in front of an embassy), or because he didn’t like the twelve hour days standing in the street doing nothing!
Read more on Racism on my blog.
PC Bloggs
This is like joining the army then moaning because you actually have to go to a war zone. All jobs have their unpalatable side. We just have to get on with it – or resign.
All police must know that when they join the force, they are supposed to adopt a neutral stance.
PC Bloggs, You can’t always stop somebody feeling the way they do – controlling and supressing strong feelings in line of his/her duty is a different matter and was obviously the right thing to do, though this police officer admitted he couldn’t manage it.
I did finish my post by saying that being excused was not the right thing, the public deserves more professionalism, but we don’t live in a perfect world, human beings are fallible, even police officers. Hopefully this will be an isolated case.
The police officer has clearly acted against the anti-discrimination law of the EU members and the jurisdiction of the Court of Justice of the EU. See Website of the European Commission: Respecting fundamental rights while ensuring security and justice in the European Union
“The EU Treaty now covers the four internal market freedoms, namely free movement of goods, services, people and capital. It also bans all discrimination based on nationality, gender, race, ethnic origin, religion, disability, age or sexual orientation.”
“The Court has ruled that all EU institutions must respect fundamental rights, as must national authorities when they are implementing EU law.”
If the EU law is properly applied in GB, the police officer will have to stand trial for discrimination based on nationality, ethnic origin, and religion.
Colin, very interesting, many thanks.