The findings of the Casey Report are rightly damning. It’s clear that there have been countless catastrophic and wide-ranging failures within the Metropolitan Police. These failures have seeped through into every rung of the Met - right to the very highest levels of leadership, including the Mayor of London in his role as London’s Police and Crime Commissioner.
To say that all police officers are bad people is - of course - wrong. However, the report demonstrates how an environment has been allowed to permeate within its ranks that has stood not only to discredit the Force as a whole, but those decent, hardworking officers who joined to uphold its values of what’s right, protecting the vulnerable, and doing best by their local area.
It is imperative that all of those within the Met’s leadership understand and engage with the report’s findings, fully implementing the necessary changes across the Force.
Words will no longer be enough. Now, more than ever, action is needed.
We owe it to London, to the vast majority of those in the Police who joined for all the right reasons, and to those who have been so let down by past failings.