What was shocking about Baroness Louise Casey’s report on the Metropolitan Police, published last week, was not simply individual scandals, but the combined failure across so much of the service.
We already knew of some of the most high-profile and breath-taking failings, but most worrying for the public, and for the many decent police officers in London and elsewhere, was the scale of the problem. Sir Mark Rowley, the new Metropolitan Police Commissioner, had already started a process of clearing out those who were already known to be unfit to serve. But his task now is twofold.
Firstly, to empower the good and systematically rid the service of the corrosive individuals who are not just “bad-apples”, but something far more insidious.
Those who are responsible for recruiting, vetting, training and then supervising must have ethical standards and a commitment to openness and honesty without reproach.
We all know that those who are morally flawed, or just downright incompetent, are likely to recruit, protect and even promote people in their own image. Preventing such people entering the service must take priority, as it is too late when steps then have to be taken to remove them from their posts.
In my lifetime, the police have recruited, too often, not on the suitability of service in a modern, forward-looking force, but because of the height, weight, and – yes - the gender of those they were bringing into the service. Those days have gone, but it is not clear whether the criteria used for entry or promotion has caught up with the requirements of today.
Here’s a thought: in moving forward, the Met Commissioner and Chief Constables across the country must balance transparency about the problems with maintaining moral, and sending positive messages to attract men and women committed to delivering top-quality service in the years to come.
Labour Leader, Keir Starmer’s, commitment to protecting women and girls can only be achieved if we not only have the right people with the right attitude in place, but, frankly, if we recruit many more women into the police force.
It is a tough job, but it requires brains not braun. It requires a commitment to care about victims of crime, the resilience to keep going when, day-after-day, you see the worst of human nature. Above all, it requires people, prepared and able at every level of the service, to learn management skills. Simply not prepared to put up with evidence trashed, DNA samples contaminated, indifference built in to the daily routine.
It requires those expected to detect criminality in the community to detect wrongdoing in their own service. In other words, to build on the best we have – those who will earn the respect of both the public and their colleagues.
So much has been said about what needs to be done. The very real and difficult challenge is to now put those steps in place, and take action to rebuild trust.
