BLACK and Asian men are more likely to be locked up for drug-dealing offences than white defendants, according to research published by the Sentencing Council today.

The official body looked at penalties received by 14,000 defendants aged 26-50 for possession with intent to supply between April 2012 and March 2015.

It found that for class-B drugs, 37 per cent of white offenders could expect to receive a custodial sentence compared with 46 per cent of Asian, 44 of black and 46 of other ethnicities including Chinese.

Stand up to Racism convener Rahul Patel told the Morning Star that he was “wholly unsurprised” by the findings, which he says reflect “deep failures to challenge the institutional racism at the heart of the justice system.”

These failures can be seen in the recent “ramping up” of stop-and-search measures, the activist said, which disproportionately target black and minority-ethnic people.

Criminal barrister Brian Richardson said the report confirmed what he had witnessed at the bar “and argued about for a long time.”

He told the Star: “More than 20 years after the publication of the Stephen Lawrence Inquiry Report, Black and Asian defendants continue to face institutional racism at all levels of the criminal-justice system.”

The research also found that Asian offenders were being jailed for an average of 4 per cent longer — equal to around one month more — than white offenders found guilty of the same crime.

Mr Patel suggested that Asian men are given harsher sentences due to harmful stereotypes that they are involved in “grooming gangs or triad culture” and recommended training to tackle such stereotypes.