LABOUR is trying to reverse sentencing guidelines aimed at protecting black people from unfair treatment in the criminal justice system, it emerged yesterday.

Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood is to write to the independent Sentencing Council, urging it to reverse guidance advising judges to take into account the ethnicity or faith of the defendant before deciding whether or not to imprison.

Official figures show that people from ethnic minorities consistently receive longer sentences than white people for comparable offences.