Met Chief faces Asian officer's 'dossier of discrimination'

Friends of Assistant Commissioner Tarique Ghaffur claimed that he has compiled a dossier of more than 30 allegations of discrimination at the top of Scotland Yard and the Home Office.

The file is said to contain private e-mails and other correspondence showing that a senior Whitehall official colluded in a campaign to destroy the career of the Ugandan-born officer.

Sir Ian Blair (right) is on a collision course with Tarique Ghaffur (left) over 'dossier of discrimination'

Mr Ghaffur is reported to be launching a race discrimination claim against the Metropolitan Police.

He alleges that Moira Wallace, director of police and counterterrorism at the Home Office, conspired with Sir Ian and his deputy Paul Stephenson to strip him of his responsibilities and sideline him from his job overseeing security for the 2012 Olympics in London.

The 53-year-old is unhappy that Sir Ian decided not to renew his contract next March. Friends say he had hoped to stay until the Olympics and to one day receive a knighthood.

But senior colleagues of Sir Ian say he is determined to show 'strong leadership' and will not be intimidated into a U-turn by Mr Ghaffur and his supporters at the National Black Police Association.

They said he has no plans to give Mr Ghaffur a contract extension and his old Olympics job back.

Sources said it was extremely unlikely that mediation between the pair  - announced on Friday - would succeed.

One said: 'This appears to be heading to an employment tribunal, and it could get very ugly indeed.

'The Commissioner is right to stand up to him.'

Further details of Mr Ghaffur's alleged case against the Met were leaked yesterday.

His dossier is said to include correspondence between Wallace, Blair and Len Duvall, chairman of the Metropolitan Police Authority, in which they discuss Mr Ghaffur.

Sources say Mr Ghaffur's legal move was triggered by an e-mail in March from Miss Wallace  -  sent to several senior Met officers  -  that revealed that he had effectively been sacked as Olympics security chief.

It was a post that Mr Ghaffur had been given in 2006 by the then Home Secretary, John Reid.

He was replaced by Robert Raine, a senior Home Office colleague, who is co-ordinating the work of 24 government agencies and police.

In a thinly-veiled reference to Mr Ghaffur, Miss Wallace said in the email: 'It would be helpful if no one described themselves as Olympic security co-ordinator.' Mr Ghaffur's dossier also cites a catalogue of alleged abuses that stretch back to early 2005, when Sir Ian became Met chief.

• Another race row engulfed the police yesterday following claims that half the country's chief constables snubbed an inquiry into discrimination against Muslim officers.

At least 20 of the 43 forces in England and Wales failed to co-operate with a survey of the treatment of officers from ethnic minorities, said the National Association of Muslim Police.

The association has urged Home Secretary Jacqui Smith to intervene.