It has been a torrid few years, largely self-inflicted, for the Metropolitan police, Britain’s biggest police force and the standard bearer for policing in the UK. In the first half of this year alone, it was revealed that it missed a serial sex attacker in its ranks, David Carrick, even when there were repeated warnings about him. Then came the Casey review after Wayne Couzens’s murder of Sarah Everard, which showed a force ridden with sexism, racism and prejudice, too often failing the public and people in its own workforce.
These failings came after about three years’ worth of blunders and wrongdoing so eye-catching that they have shattered confidence in the Met. From nauseating hate messages shared among staff, to officers photographing the dead, to a leadership more concerned with denial than cleaning up the force.
One question policymakers and members of the public will be wondering is whether the force is still falling? Has it hit rock bottom or, after the disasters it has been through, are there more confidence-sapping revelations still to come?
As of Monday, and courtesy of BBC News, the answer appears to be yes. The Met seems to be accepting the allegations that it let a key suspect in the Stephen Lawrence murder, Matthew White, slip through its fingers despite information from witnesses that he may have been involved.
White is now dead, the Met investigation into Lawrence was shut in 2020 and remains so, and at least three prime suspects remain free.
“Unfortunately, too many mistakes were made in the initial investigation and the impact of them continues to be seen,” said the Met’s deputy assistant commissioner, Matt Ward, on Monday in response to the BBC story.
Sir Mark Rowley is nine months into his term heading up the force and he has vowed to introduce reforms. His commissionership will face its own share of problems but it will also be weighed down by blunders so large from the past that they lead people – such as Louise Casey in her report – to question whether the Met is beyond redemption and can continue to exist in its current form.
The Met is living proof of the writer William Faulkner’s line: “The past is never dead. It’s not even past.” And it is people such as Lawrence’s parents, Doreen and Neville, and his friend Duwayne Brooks who live with the emotional toll.
More bad news is to come. Public confidence figures due out next month will be the first to capture the period after Casey and Carrick. On the key measure as identified by Rowley – are the police doing a good job in your local area? – the Met stands at 49%, down sharply from 2017 when Cressida Dick became commissioner. The expectation will be that it falls further.
Dame Elish Angiolini is thought to be planning to release her government-ordered report on the Couzens scandal this autumn. It is expected to be critical and painful.
The Conservative government has shown little sign of contemplating radical reform. But it is expected to be replaced within 18 months by Labour, and it was notable that the Lawrence revelations led the shadow home secretary, Yvette Cooper, to speak out. “Full and independent investigation into everything that went wrong is essential,” she said,
The next government may have an appetite to up the pressure on the Met or, to put it another way, speed up the journey to a police force that more Londoners can trust.
