Darker-skinned staff are often cast as risky, ungrateful, angry or in need of support whereas lighter-skinned employees - unconsciously perceived as trustworthy and approachable - receive quicker empathy and leniency, the report found. Author Shereen Daniels says Scotland Yard's HR systems, leadership, governance and culture is biased towards unspoken norms of who is welcomed, promoted, and protected, so-called whiteness. It rewards those who align with dominant values and punishes those who challenge or differ from them, allowing exclusion to be framed as professionalism.