The London Police Service says it has a plan in place to better reflect the community.
The new diversity plan, unveiled at Thursday's police services board meeting, focuses on recruitment.
Insp. Kelly O'Callaghan says they can't sit back and wait and hope that people will walk in with applications.
She says engagement with the community, particularly at the secondary school level, is key for the plan to be successful.
An internal survey in 2013 found that 20 per cent of officers are female, and there are small numbers of visible minorities and aboriginals. No males identified as openly gay and 2.5 per cent as lesbian.
O'Callaghan concedes it won't be an overnight change, but she's hoping to get the ball rolling now so that a decade from now the force will be significantly more diverse.
"We're going to be reaching out to high school guidance counsellors to set up some future meetings with kids who are in high school who are considering a career in policing," she says.
"There are secondary school officers in there, so part of the plan is to have them engage on more of a recruitment level as well as their other duties while they're there, and actually add to their job description to make that part of their actual job description."
(AM980)
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