Recommendation 1

The interim report of Sir Andy Cooke, His Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Constabulary, concluded that West Midlands Police had been subject to “confirmation bias” in their assessment of Maccabi Tel Aviv fans. We agree with this judgment; our inquiry has found that despite a wealth of evidence available regarding the Amsterdam disorder, West Midlands Police relied on inaccurate information on the behaviour of Maccabi Tel Aviv fans in reaching a view of them as unusually high-risk. It is difficult to pinpoint exactly why this inaccurate narrative took hold, but it is clear that West Midlands Police failed to do even basic due diligence on the information they received. This included false information that was generated by AI. West Midlands Police also failed to retain contemporaneous notes relating to matters central to their decision making. In addition, West Midlands Police continually emphasised that it was this unique risk from the Maccabi Tel Aviv fans which led to the recommendation to ban away fans, and not local community tensions, despite evidence of risk emanating from local communities in Birmingham. The initial attempt by West Midlands Police to downplay the role of local community tensions was unbalanced and ultimately served to undermine confidence in both the decision and the force itself. (Conclusion, Paragraph 13)