Another bad week for British policing

We’ve seen two sides of policing this week - the terrible and the heroic. Sadly, the balance is tipped to more of the terrible, I’m afraid.

Picture credit: BBC

This week, BBC’s Panorama programme exposed some appalling behaviour by officers and staff based in the Metropolitan Police’s Charing Cross police station. Hidden camera footage showed serving officers calling for immigrants to be shot, making sexualised comments to colleagues and sharing racist views about immigrants and Muslims, and revelling in the use of force against detained persons. At last count, 10 officers have now been suspended and Mark Rowley, the Commissioner, says he wants to sack them all.

The Met has struggled with repeated instances of such terrible attitudes and behaviour by officers, most shockingly with the  murder of Sarah Everard by a serving police officer in 2021.

Their response has been to undertake a widespread review of vetting, a crackdown on inappropriate behaviours where reported, and a tightening of recruitment practices. I was in the Met when this process began and nobody in the force could have been in any doubt about what was required of them - I remember our team attending a mandatory face-to-face training session presented by a very senior officer where the law was laid down in no uncertain terms, as well as a furious email from the then Commissioner, Cressida Dick, setting her expectations.

These lowlife officers and staff in the Met - pathetic, inadequate knuckle draggers all of them - represent the tiny minority, but they do massive and disproportionate amounts of damage to the public trust in the police.

Then just as that was starting to land, news of a terrorist attack at a synagogue in Manchester.

On Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar, a man drove a car at worshippers and then jumped out and started stabbing those nearby, before trying to get inside to where a service had been underway, and terrified worshippers were sheltering.

Greater Manchester Police received the first emergency call within a minute, and quickly declared “PLATO” (the police response to a marauding terrorist attack). Armed officers were on scene within minutes and the suspect, wearing what appeared to be a ‘suicide belt’, was confronted outside the synagogue and subsequently shot by police. When he tried to get up a moment later, he was shot again - almost certainly because officers feared that he would try to set off the device.

Picture credit: PA Media

The police response here was quick and decisive and undoubtedly saved many lives - some good news in amongst all the terrible events.

Tragically it now appears as though one of the two people who died was hit by a round from a police firearm while he sheltered inside the synagogue.

I can only begin to comprehend the immense grief and devastation experienced by the families and loved ones of the victims. I hope they find solace in their faith.

I do however understand a little better that the officer or officers who fired the shots are going through a whole whirlpool of emotions - relief that they brought the attack to an end, sadness that they had to take the life of the suspect, and no doubt horror that a bystander was apparently shot. No police officer goes out on duty intending to hurt or kill members of the public. Not even armed officers, who are highly trained for just this sort of incident, where the public are faced with determined lethal violence.

All of this will be investigated, of course, and lessons will be learned. I hope that the ever hopeless Independent Office of Police Conduct (IOPC) approach their investigation with empathy and understanding, and that the matter is resolved as quickly as possible, for all concerned - victims and police officers.

Obviously and rightly the public, media and politicians are outraged by the opinions and actions of a group of police and staff in the Met. I'm disgusted too - that is my previous employer and therefore they are previous colleagues of mine.

But I hope that within the maelstrom of anger we realise too that the huge, huge majority of officers are out there doing the right thing - putting themselves in harm's way to protect the public.