Hundreds of people have been quickly arrested, charged and prosecuted for taking part in riots in the UK in July and August 2024. This has happened despite capacity pressures throughout the criminal justice system.

This Insight looks at how the police and the wider criminal justice system have responded to the riots.

What was the scale of the disorder?

Between 30 July and 7 August 2024, an estimated 29 anti-immigration demonstrations and riots took place across 27 towns and cities in the UK. Many of these were violent, with participants attacking mosques and hotels housing asylum seekers. Known far-right activists promoted and attended the riots.

The National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) confirmed that, as of 30 August 2024, 1,280 people had been arrested for their involvement, with 796 people charged. It also said that the police had “identified hundreds more suspects in connection with the disorder”, suggesting further arrests and charges will follow. On 2 September 2024, the government said 570 people had been brought before the courts.

This was the most significant disorder in the UK since the 2011 riots, in which at least 4,000 people were arrested (within one month of the event) and 1,984 prosecuted (within two months).

How did the police respond to the disorder?

The disorder was mostly spontaneous, rather than planned. This meant that police forces had to deploy officers rapidly at short notice. Some forces had to share resources: for example, West Midlands Police officers supported operations in Nottingham, Liverpool, Rotherham and Tamworth. Separately, Police Scotland supplied 120 officers to the Police Service of Northern Ireland to support the operations in Belfast.

The government has said that specialist police officers, trained in public order, worked more than 40,000 shifts over the period, with 6,600 deployed on a single day. To mobilise these officers, their rest days were cancelled and their shift patterns were changed. The acting national chair of the Police Federation of England and Wales highlighted the pressures faced by officers and warned of the future impact of fatigue on officers.

Reports indicate that police officers were injured during the disorder, although it is not yet known how many.

How have police identified the people involved?

While some people were arrested during the riots, the majority were arrested afterwards. The police have reportedly compiled video evidence through a range of tactics, including:

The police can then use retrospective facial-recognition software to identify suspects from footage.

Specialist officers from Regional Organised Crime Units are also working to identify those who encouraged or incited riots online, according to the NPCC.

What are the accusations of ‘two-tier policing’?

Some commentators have accused the police of ‘two-tier policing’ in their response to the riots. This is a view that political pressure leads the police to act more leniently to protests and incidents associated with left-wing causes, compared to those involving right-wing causes.

The concept pre-dates the riots and has been applied to a range of situations, such as the policing of Black Lives Matter protests during covid-19 restrictions. The Conservative MP Robert Jenrick also used the phrase in Parliament to criticise the Metropolitan Police’s handling of protests related to the conflict between Israel and Hamas.

The view is highly contested and has been rejected by the Metropolitan Police and the Home Secretary.

It is extremely difficult to compare police responses to different protests or instances of disorder, given the vastly different scale, context and incidents involved. There is therefore no available evidence we could use to reliably measure whether the police respond to incidents differently due to political pressure.

What have people been charged with?

The riots have been treated as a priority by the police and courts. The government has stated that the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) deployed over 100 additional prosecutors to increase its capacity.

Many of those prosecuted to date appear to have been charged with violent disorder, under section 2 of the Public Order Act 1986. This carries a maximum penalty of five years’ imprisonment.

The Director of Public Prosecutions, Stephen Parkinson, confirmed on 20 August 2024 that the CPS had authorised the first charges of ‘riot’ and that “more will follow”. The offence of riot, under section 1 of the 1986 act, is more serious than violent disorder and carries a maximum sentence of 10 years’ imprisonment, a fine, or both. He said it would take longer for riot cases to reach court because more evidence is required for conviction.

Some people are facing additional charges, such as attempted arson, burglary or racially aggravated criminal damage. Several people have also been convicted for online activity relating to the riots, including for offences such as promoting and possessing material that incites racial hatred, under part 3 of the Public Order Act 1986.

Neil Basu, former Assistant Commissioner of the Met, suggested that some rioters should be charged with terrorism offences. This view is supported by researchers at the Royal United Services Institute think tank, who said it was important for “severe cases of far-right violence” to be recognised as terrorism. The Director of Public Prosecutions has confirmed that the CPS is considering terrorism charges.

How have prosecutions affected prison capacity?

Amid an urgent prisons capacity crisis, there are concerns that there are not enough prison places to accommodate people held on remand or sentenced to prison for their involvement in the riots.

In response, the government has activated Operation Early Dawn in parts of England. This means defendants are held in police custody and only brought to a magistrates’ court for their initial hearing if a prison place is first confirmed available. This avoids the risk of a court ordering that someone be remanded in custody without a prison space to accommodate them. The government also brought forward plans to open 567 temporary prison places in an attempt to meet the immediate additional demand.

Before the riots, the government had already implemented several emergency measures to help ease capacity pressures on prisons in the short-term. As part of this, from 10 September 2024, some people will be released on licence after serving 40% of their sentence, rather than the usual 50%.

How will the riots affect policing?

In response to the riots, the Home Secretary has asked HM Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue Services, the NPCC and the College of Policing to conduct a review to improve the co-ordination and intelligence for public order policing.

Support and intelligence for public order policing are provided by the National Police Coordination Centre (NPoCC), hosted by the NPCC. It is also the central point for facilitating the ‘lending’ of police officers and other resources from one force to another (known as mutual aid). The Home Secretary said after the riots that the “infrastructure and systems” underpinning the NPoCC were “too weak”.

The Prime Minister has also announced the creation of a National Violent Disorder Programme to bring “together the best policing capabilities from across the country to share intelligence on the activity of violent groups so the authorities can swiftly intervene to arrest them”. He said the programme would also consider how to deploy facial recognition technology more widely.

Several charities and civil liberties organisations have written an open letter to oppose any wider deployment of live facial recognition technology, saying that it would impact people’s rights to privacy, freedom of expression and freedom of assembly.

About the author: Will Downs is a researcher at the Commons Library specialising in policing and public order.

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