Around one in 10 police officers shouldn’t have passed vetting stage, inspector warns

Around one in 10 police officers should not have got through the vetting stage, an inspector has warned.

HM Inspector of Constabulary Matt Parr said it is a “widespread, historic” problem that has contributed to a drop in public confidence in the police, but the issue is finally starting to be addressed.

He told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme: “When we reported back in November about vetting across the country, we looked at hundreds of officers that had joined the police…. about 10% of them should not have got through vetting.

“That was not a random sample, these are cases we had highlighted but a significant number of officers joined the police that, in our view, should not have done. This is a problem that is widespread, I think it has been historic. I do think at last policing has smelt the coffee, woken up, recognised the scale of the problem.”

Inspector Parr added that a government drive to recruit 20,000 new officers should not cause a drop in vetting standards. He said: “The general problem is public confidence in the police has definitely taken some serious knocks, and the most important thing now is to restore this confidence… I don’t accept that the new 20,000 officers can be used as an excuse for lowering standards of the people that join.”

His comments come after Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley said on Wednesday (25 January) that two to three Metropolitan Police officers are expected to face criminal charges in court every week in the coming months.

He told the London Assembly Police and Crime Committee that more “painful stories” will emerge as moves progress to remove hundreds of corrupt officers who are thought to be serving.

The move aims to remove hundreds of corrupt officers who are thought to be serving in the force, and comes in the wake of the case of PC David Carrick being unmasked as one of the UK’s most prolific sex offenders last week. PC Carrick served as a Met officer for 20 years before he was sacked from the force, after pleading guilty to 49 sex offence charges.

Sir Mark told the committee that the criminal cases are a “mix of dishonesty, violence and violence against women and girls”, and urged the public not to lose heart as the force roots out corrupts officers.

A new Met Police integrity hotline has received “tens of calls” a week, leading to new investigations, Sir Mark said, a third of which relate to other forces. He told the committee: “Even though this is a Met appeal, one in three of the calls coming through roughly are for other forces. We’re passing information on as well. Through our challenges, we’re helping the rest of policing confront some issues as well.”

He added: “Lifting the stone and revealing painful truths will not be resolved overnight, and I mustn’t pretend it will do, and I hope you understand that that can’t be done. We have to prepare for more painful stories as we confront the issues that we face.

“We’ve discussed before, the systemic failings that create these problems of these officers who corrupt our integrity, and as we put in more resource, more assertive tactics, as we are more open to people reporting incidents to us from within and from without the organisation, and as we more determinedly take on these cases, it will tackle the problems that we face but it won’t… it won’t be rapid and it will be painful.”

Inspector Parr said the suggestion two to three Metropolitan Police officers are expected to appear in court for the next few months shows the force is “doing the right thing” in rooting out misconduct.

He added: “This is things improving. The fact they are coming to court does show the Met are detecting them, that they are rooting them out and they are getting them through the courts and they are getting them dismissed.”

1,000 previous cases under review

In the wake of PC Carrick’s conviction, around 1,000 previous cases involving Met officers and staff who were accused of sexual offences or domestic violence are being reviewed to make sure they were handled correctly. This process is expected to be completed by the end of March.

Sir Mark said that as well as these, in the coming weeks and months he expects two or three officers per week to appear in court charged with offences linked to dishonesty, sexual offences, violence or domestic violence.

The commissioner said the force had not “applied the same level of ruthlessness” to upholding its integrity as it applied to fighting crime, and admitted that the Met will “probably find many cases where we got it wrong” in its review of around 1,000 allegations relating to officers and staff.

Sir Mark said he was "moving heaven and earth" to finish the review by March when the findings of the review will be reported.