It has emerged that West Yorkshire Police permits Black, Asian, and Minority Ethnic (BAME) candidates to submit job applications all year round, but White people must wait for specific recruitment drives, sparking accusations of positive discrimination.

The police force claims the move is designed to boost diversity numbers and make the police more reflective of the area's multicultural society.

An internal whistleblower told the U.K. newspaper that Black and Asian applicants are labeled as "gold" category candidates and are encouraged to apply at any time. White candidates from Britain, Ireland, and Eastern Europe, meanwhile, are "bronze" applicants.

Rather than focusing on how qualified an applicant is, the branding effectively sees candidates prioritized initially purely on the color of their skin.

According to documents reviewed by The Telegraph, the whistleblower expressed concerns to senior management over the application process, stating:

"The process restricts progression opportunities for White British candidates, while individuals from other backgrounds are swiftly advanced through recruitment stages."

"We are currently accepting applications for the two police constable entry programmes (uniform and detective) from people from our under-represented groups… If you are not from one of these groups, please keep checking this page for future recruitment opportunities," reads the recruitment page of the West Yorkshire Police website.

The force, Britain's fourth-largest, insisted that "enabling people from an ethnic minority background to apply early does not give them an advantage in the application process" and that all applications are held until recruitment is opened for everyone."

It claimed the current system simply allows the force to "attract talent from a pool of applicants who reflect the diverse communities we serve."

West Yorkshire, a county in the north of England, has become an increasingly diverse area of Britain with a large Asian population, particularly from India and Pakistan.

According to the 2021 Census, 23.4 percent of the population in West Yorkshire identified as belonging to non-White ethnic groups. This had more than doubled from the 11.4 percent registered two decades previously at the 2001 Census.