The new Scotland Yard commissioner’s in-tray shows an array of big challenges, with some crises already foreseeable. The main issues deal with guns, money and the sins of the past.
Rising knife crime and violent offences will need addressing and will need to show an improvement. The problem is one tactic, increasing stop and search, may be popular with some officers but can trigger tensions among London’s communities in return for very little crime being detected.
The biggest issue for the Met commissioner is going to be money. Already the new chief faces a budget that needs £400m of cuts by 2020.
That in turn jeopardises officer numbers, which are down to just over 31,000. Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe, the outgoing commissioner, says the capital cannot go much lower and stay sufficiently safe. More so because the capital’s population is growing.
But that may not be the biggest financial calamity facing the Met. The government wants to review the amount of funding police forces get, and is expected to move money from urban to rural areas. The London mayor, Sadiq Khan, says this could result in an additional cut for the Met ranging from £184m to £700m from an annual £3bn budget.
There is no foreseeable way the Met would not lose money if the government presses ahead with the review; it represents one quarter of all spending on police in England and Wales.
Last time the government attempted to change the formula, the technical complexities forced it into blunders and the attempt was dropped. This time the Met comes forewarned. Even the lowest estimate would mean a financial hole so big the force would face having to slim down to an unrecognisable size.
The Conservative government has toyed with stripping the Met of its lead of counter-terrorism and handing it to the National Crime Agency. One reason this has not happened yet is that the NCA is already struggling to do its day job of leading the fight against serious and organised crime. But the NCA is seen as improving and its leadership believes it may be up to the task soon, if the government dares to make the move.
The debate about counter-terrorism is part of an existential debate around the Met. Should it keep its national functions, including counter-terrorism and diplomatic protection, or become a London-only force? One reason for the potential change is the Met’s failure to be as good as other big forces in tackling crime, according to critics.
The quip about the Met is that the force is exactly who you would want if your loved one is kidnapped, but is less good at more regular crime.
The police inspectorate in February 2016 said the Met was substandard and required improvement in keeping people safe and reducing crime, investigating crime and managing offenders. Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary also found the force was failing to protect children.
Other big forces were rated good, which chimes with another emerging theme. In some areas the Met is falling behind other forces, according to senior sources in policing. It used to pride itself on being ahead.
Police are dealing with new crime types and the growth in the vulnerability agenda, covering child sexual abuse, abuse of the elderly and a growth in the belief that chasing crime numbers is outdated, and that focusing on reducing harm best serves the public.
If that is not enough for the commissioner to be getting on with, the worst may be yet to come. Among senior Met leaders there has been over the years concerns about a “legitimacy gap”. The force is woefully short of looking like the city it serves, and London’s ethnic minority population is 40% and forecast to grow. The Conservative government, like Labour before it, has rebuffed the Met’s calls for a law change to allow positive discrimination, and thus it will be well into this century before the Met stops being disproportionately white.
Later this year, a government-appointed panel will report on the Daniel Morgan murder case. The 1987 murder of the private detective found with an axe embedded in his head in south London remains unsolved and the Met accepted the case was tainted by police corruption. The report is guaranteed to be uncomfortable reading, but the question is how painful it will be.
Inquiries into undercover policing abuses and corruption in the Stephen Lawrence case continue, as do investigations into claims the Met covered up claims of sexual abuse. On top of that, some of those caught up in the disastrous Met investigation into claims members of the establishment abused children are threatening to sue.
The first crisis the new commissioner faces may involve guns, terrorism and the battle to keep the capital safe amid an enduring severe jihadi threat.
In December 2015, a suspect was shot dead close to Wood Green crown court in north London. The suspect, Jermaine Baker, was sitting in the front seat of a car. An imitation firearm was recovered from the rear of the vehicle’s interior.
The officer who fired, known only as W80, was arrested by the Independent Police Complaints Commission. That provoked fury among armed Met officers, some of whom threatened to quit carrying their weapons.
Prosecutors are expected to decide in April whether there will be any criminal charges, and if there are, police chiefs will anxiously await the reaction from firearms officers.
There is an urgent attempt to recruit more armed officers after the gun attacks on Paris in November 2015 that killed 130 people. The Met has 400 out of the extra 600 it is trying to enlist.
The new commissioner will be at the mercy of events they have some control over, and many more they simply cannot.
