A POLICE commander has said that Bradford now is a "different" place to what the city was in 2001, 20 years on from the riots.

Chief Superintendent Daniel Greenwood, District Commander for Bradford Police, said: “The Bradford in which I am the District Commander is different to the Bradford in 2001.

"It isn’t a place where we see significant instances of disorder and unrest; it is a city which is celebrating its diversity, which is looking forward and a city which is proud of its progress.

“The Bradford Riots happened 20 years ago against the backdrop of community concerns about the presence of the National Front in the city and deep social divides amongst our communities.

“In the two decades since then, we have worked hard alongside the other agencies and with our communities to overhaul how we engage, how we listen and how we respond to community concerns.

"We introduced, and continue to invest in, neighbourhood policing – our visible, local and familiar footprint across the district, which is vastly different to back in 2001.

“The changes we have made are many and varied and together help to make a huge difference.

“Officers are now much better trained in diversity, community inclusion and faith awareness – but it is also important that our own organisation is representative of all our communities and in Bradford the percentage of frontline officers from an ethnic minority community is currently 13.6 per cent.

"We work with independent members of our communities to help inform our decisions, to scrutinise our actions around key areas like hate crime and stop and search, and we listen to them when they tell us we aren’t getting it right.

"We also work daily with representatives from faith, religious and community groups to ensure we understand and respond to issues affecting our diverse communities.

“We have increased the accountability and scrutiny of policing, investing in body worn video to maximise public confidence in the policing we deliver and overhauling our complaints process.

“We have worked alongside the local authority, schools, businesses and the community who have also worked hard to address the issues that led to the disorder in 2001 and will continue to work with them over the coming years."