The Inquiry That Refuses to Inquire
Seven years. That's how long the Undercover Policing Inquiry has been running, ostensibly investigating one of the most egregious abuses of state power in modern British history. Seven years since Sir John Mitting was appointed to examine how undercover police officers infiltrated political groups, trade unions, and campaign organisations for decades — deceiving activists into intimate relationships, spying on grieving families seeking justice, and undermining the fundamental right to political dissent.
Seven years, and the women who were sexually manipulated by state agents are still waiting for answers. The families who were spied upon whilst mourning murdered relatives are still denied the truth. The environmental activists whose campaigns were sabotaged from within are still fighting for basic transparency.
This isn't justice delayed. This is justice denied by design.
A System Designed to Protect Itself
The Undercover Policing Inquiry was established in 2015 following revelations that officers from the Special Demonstration Squad and National Public Order Intelligence Unit had engaged in systematic deception spanning four decades. Officers adopted the identities of dead children, formed sexual relationships under false pretences, and even fathered children with activists they were tasked to monitor.
Yet at every turn, the inquiry has prioritised the privacy of perpetrators over the rights of victims. More than 200 undercover officers have been granted anonymity, their real names hidden behind cipher codes. Key documents remain classified. Witness statements are redacted beyond recognition.
Sir John Mitting, himself a former Special Branch barrister, has consistently ruled in favour of state secrecy over public accountability. When core participants — the legal term for those affected by undercover policing — have challenged these decisions, they've been told that national security trumps their right to know who violated their lives.
The Women Who Refuse to Be Silenced
At the heart of this scandal are the women who were deceived into relationships with undercover officers. Helen Steel, who was manipulated by officer John Barker for two years. 'Jessica', who discovered that her partner of six years was a police spy only when activists exposed his true identity. 'Andrea', who was left to raise a child fathered by an undercover officer who simply vanished from their lives.
These women have fought for over a decade for basic recognition of the violations they suffered. They've endured invasive questioning about their sexual histories whilst their abusers hide behind state-granted anonymity. They've watched as the Metropolitan Police paid out millions in settlements whilst admitting no institutional wrongdoing.
Their treatment exposes the inquiry's fundamental flaw: it operates within a system that views state agents as inherently more deserving of protection than the citizens they harmed. When 'Jessica' requested that her abuser's real name be disclosed, she was told this would breach his human rights. The irony is staggering — a woman whose most intimate relationship was a state-sanctioned lie is denied information about her own violation to protect the privacy of her violator.
Beyond Individual Harm: Democracy Under Surveillance
The undercover policing scandal extends far beyond personal relationships. Officers infiltrated trade unions during industrial disputes, environmental groups campaigning against corporate interests, and anti-racism organisations seeking justice for police killings. They didn't just spy on these groups — they actively disrupted their legitimate political activities.
Officer Mark Kennedy spent seven years embedded in environmental movements, participating in over 40 arrests of genuine activists whilst feeding intelligence back to both police and corporate interests. His exposure in 2010 revealed a network of surveillance that treated democratic participation as inherently suspicious.
The inquiry has documented how undercover units maintained files on over 1,000 political groups, from the Anti-Apartheid Movement to campaigns for justice following deaths in police custody. The message was clear: dissent from state or corporate power would be monitored, infiltrated, and undermined.
The Accountability Mirage
Proponents of the inquiry process argue that transparency takes time, that complex investigations require careful consideration of competing interests. This misses the fundamental point: the inquiry's structure ensures that meaningful accountability remains impossible.
By granting anonymity to officers, the inquiry prevents proper scrutiny of their actions. By accepting state claims of national security, it allows the same institutions that authorised these violations to determine what the public can know about them. By prioritising process over justice, it transforms accountability into an endless bureaucratic exercise.
Sir John Mitting has announced that the inquiry will likely continue until at least 2026. By then, it will have run for over a decade whilst many of those responsible for authorising undercover operations have retired or died. The delay isn't a bug in the system — it's a feature.
What Real Accountability Would Look Like
Genuine accountability would start with transparency. The names of undercover officers who violated citizens' rights should be public record, not state secrets. The organisations they infiltrated deserve to know the full extent of surveillance they faced. The women who were deceived deserve to know the real identities of the men who manipulated them.
It would include meaningful sanctions. Not just individual officers, but the commanders who authorised these operations and the politicians who turned a blind eye to them. It would involve institutional reform that prevents future abuses rather than simply documenting past ones.
Most fundamentally, it would recognise that in a democracy, the state serves the people — not the other way around. When state agents abuse their power, the presumption should favour disclosure, not secrecy.
The Truth They Don't Want You to Know
The undercover policing scandal reveals something profound about how power operates in Britain. When the state violates citizens' rights, it investigates itself through processes designed to minimise rather than maximise accountability. It grants anonymity to perpetrators whilst exposing victims to further scrutiny. It treats transparency as a threat to security rather than a foundation of democracy.
The women still fighting for justice after more than a decade understand what many refuse to acknowledge: the inquiry isn't failing to deliver accountability — it's succeeding in preventing it.
Seven years in, and the message is unmistakable: when the state investigates itself, justice isn't delayed — it's deliberately destroyed.
