I fear we are going to see cover-ups when it comes to the ethnicity of people arrested and charged with serious crimes.

New guidance published today by the National Police Chiefs’ Council and the College of Policing recommends that forces consider disclosing extra details about suspects.

The Home Secretary said she welcomed the move, but I think this is a cop out, if you'll excuse the pun.

Firstly, there is no legal obligation to do this, it's just up to individual police forces. Secondly, it only seems to apply to 'high-profile and sensitive investigations'.

Patrick Christys reacts to new police guidance to reveal suspects’ ethnicity and nationality

Well who decides what's high-profile? Isn't that for the public to decide?

A case can become more high profile if the suspect turns out to be foreign-born, an asylum seeker, or an illegal immigrant because, by its very nature, the British public feel a deep sense of dissatisfaction at people who have either just broken into Britain, or come here legally and accepted our generous hospitality, going on and committing crimes.

Especially crimes against women and girls.

I can see a situation happening where someone from a migrant hotel commits a horrific crime. The locals know it was someone at the hotel. The media learn it was someone from the hotel.

The police decide it's not 'high-profile' enough to release the information, people get very angry, we start to see protests and then they finally decide to reveal that it was a bloke from Eritrea who arrived across the Channel a few days ago.

And in that scenario, what's different to what already happens? Nothing will have changed, they'll still be accused of a cover-up, the public will still feel lied to.

Warwickshire police are still refusing to reveal the nationalities of two men charged in connection with the alleged rape of a 12-year-old girl. Obviously both those men are innocent until proven guilty. So is the man charged in connection with the alleged Liverpool victory parade car incident. Merseyside Police published the ethnicity of the suspect there within a couple of hours.

In fact, just to show the absurdity of this, five days after the events in Liverpool, there was a serious collision in Leicester that left five pedestrians injured. Leicestershire Police took the opposite stance to the Merseyside force and declined to reveal the ethnic or nationality background details of those detained.

We're not stupid. We all know the police seem happy to release ethnicity and nationality data when the suspect is white, and they seem reluctant to do so when they're not white.

This guidance doesn't change that. And you've got the usual suspects on the left of British media, calling the whole thing disgusting.

It's not the far-right who want it! It's just ordinary, normal members of the public.

How difficult it is for politicians and police chiefs to understand - if you've got nothing to hide about the true scale of crime committed by foreign nationals in Britain then just release the ethnicity and nationality of the suspect every single time!