More than 1,000 Met officers suspended or on restricted duties amid force clean-up

About 60 officers could face the sack each month over at least the next two years, the Met Police’s deputy assistant commissioner said

The Metropolitan Police has faced a series of harrowing scandals in recent years (PA) (PA Wire)

More than 1,000 officers in Britain’s largest police force are currently suspended or on restricted duties as bosses try to cull corrupt or incompetent staff.

Metropolitan Police Deputy Assistant Commissioner Stuart Cundy said it will take years to get rid of officers who have breached standards or failed vetting, amid a clean-up following a series of disturbing scandals.

About 60 officers could face the sack each month over at least the next two years, with about 30 facing misconduct proceedings and 30 gross incompetence hearings, he said.

The new figures come after the Independent exclusively revealed three-quarters of police officers and staff accused of violence against women are not suspended by their force despite the allegations against them.

Just 12 per cent of officers and staff are being suspended from duties after being accused of crimes such as sexual assault and domestic violence.

A series of reviews have been carried out including of officers who have faced previous allegations of domestic or sexual violence, as well as sweeps of the police national computer and database for concerning information.

The Met has faced a series of harrowing scandals, including serving armed officer Wayne Couzens, who raped and murdered Sarah Everard, and David Carrick, who was unmasked as a serial rapist.

Mr Cundy said: “This is going to take one, two or more years to root out those who are corrupt.”

Currently, of the Met’s workforce of about 34,000 officers, 201 are suspended and about 860 are on restricted duties.

Met officer Wayne Couzens exposed himself to a number of women in the months before he kidnapped, raped and murdered Sarah Everard (PA Wire)

Mr Cundy said: “If you add those two figures together, that’s over 1,000 police officers and that’s nearly the size of a small police force in other places in the country. It is a significant number.”

In the wake of Carrick’s life sentence for dozens of sexual offences, 1,600 cases were reviewed where officers had faced allegations of domestic or sexual violence over the past 10 years but no action was taken. There are currently about 450 live investigations ongoing into the cases that were reviewed.

The Met has also given figures about disciplinary processes, including:

• 100 officers have been sacked for gross misconduct in the past year, up by 66 per cent on the normal rate
• 201 officers are currently suspended, up from 69 in September last year
• 275 are awaiting a gross misconduct hearing, a significant proportion of which involved alleged violence against women and girls, compared with 136 last year
• The number of reports from the public and officers of alleged misconduct has doubled

Metropolitan Police officer David Carrick was exposed as a serial rapist (PA Media)

The force has also checked all officers against records on the police national computer, uncovering 11 cases that were subject to further assessment and five are now gross misconduct investigations.

Details of all Met employees, both civilian staff and police, were also checked against intelligence records on the Police National Database.

Fourteen are under further investigation for potential gross misconduct, with more due to be added.

The most serious of all the cases reviewed involved rape allegations.

The joint investigation by domestic abuse charity Refuge and The Independent revealed that just 24 per cent of police investigated for domestic abuse, sexual assault, rape and abuse of position were suspended across England and Wales between May 2022 and May 2023.

Data from 26 police forces shows that 1,124 police officers and staff were accused during this period, while just 269 were suspended. But the number of accusations is expected to be far higher, as not all of the 43 police forces responded to the request for information.

The figures also reveal a huge nationwide disparity in how forces respond, with Wiltshire Police suspending 83 per cent of those under investigation while Surrey Police only suspended 10 per cent.

On Monday, home secretary Suella Braverman announced plans to make it easier for police chiefs to sack rogue officers, in a written ministerial statement to the Commons.

These include bringing in a presumption that those found to have committed gross misconduct will be sacked, and making sure officers who fail vetting can be dismissed.

Conviction for certain offences including sexual crimes will automatically mean gross misconduct, and responsibility for chairing misconduct hearings will return to chief officers rather than independent legally qualified chairmen.