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The Metropolitan Police Service (abbreviated to MPS and widely known informally as "the Met") is the territorial police force responsible for law enforcement in Greater London, excluding the "square mile" of the City of London, which is the responsibility of the City of London Police.[8] The Met also has significant national responsibilities, such as co-ordinating and leading on counter-terrorism matters and protection of the British Royal Family and senior figures of Her Majesty's Government.[9]
As of October 2011, the Met employed 48,661 full-time personnel. This included 31,478 sworn police officers, 13,350 non-police staff, and 3,831 non-sworn police community support officers. This number excludes the 5,479 Special Constables, who work part-time (a minimum of 16 hours a month) and who have the same powers and uniform as their regular colleagues.[6] This makes the Metropolitan Police the largest police force in the United Kingdom by a significant margin, and one of the biggest in the world.[10]
The Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis, commonly known simply as the Commissioner, is the overall operational leader of the force, responsible and accountable to the Mayor's Office for Policing and Crime. The post of Commissioner was first held jointly by Sir Charles Rowan and Sir Richard Mayne. The post is currently occupied by Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe. The Commissioner's subordinate, the Deputy Commissioner, is currently Craig Mackey.
A number of informal names and abbreviations exists for the Metropolitan Police Service, the most common being the Met. In colloquial London (or Cockney slang), it is sometimes referred to as the Old Bill.[1] The Met is also referred to by the metonym Scotland Yard after the location of its original headquarters in a road called Great Scotland Yard in Whitehall.[11] The Met's current headquarters is New Scotland Yard, in Victoria.
The Metropolitan Police Service was founded in 1829 by
Other London emergency services:
Key to rank abbreviations: PC = Police Constable · WPC = Woman Police Constable · WRC = War Reserve Constable · DC = Detective Constable · Sgt = Sergeant · DS = Detective Sergeant · Insp = Inspector · CEO = Civilian Explosives Officer.
Since 1900, the following officers of the Metropolitan Police Service are listed by the Trust as having been killed while attempting to prevent, stop or solve a criminal act in progress:[102][103][104]
The Police Memorial Trust lists and commemorates all British police officers killed in the line of duty, and since its establishment in 1984 has erected dozens of memorials to some of those officers.
In response, Peter Hain stated: "That the special branch had a file on me dating back 40 years ago to anti-apartheid and anti-Nazi League activist days is hardly revelatory. That these files were still active for at least 10 years while I was an MP certainly is and raises fundamental questions about parliamentary sovereignty."[101]
In 2015, former Metropolitan Police Special Branch officer Peter Francis revealed that the service has spied on several former and serving Labour MPs including Harriet Harman, Peter Hain, Jack Straw, Diane Abbott, Jeremy Corbyn, Bernie Grant, Ken Livingstone, Tony Benn, Joan Ruddock and Dennis Skinner.
Notable major incidents and investigations in which the Metropolitan Police has directed or been involved include:
In 2004, there was a call from the Institute for Public Policy Research for more imaginative planning of police stations to aid in improving relations between police forces and the wider community.[51]
Most stations have temporary holding cells where an arrested person can be held until either being released without charge, bailed to appear at court on a later date, or remanded until escort to a court.
Metropolitan Police stations may house a variety of roles and ranks of police staff, such as:
Paddington Green Police Station is a station that has received much publicity for its housing of terrorism suspects in an underground complex.
The oldest Metropolitan police station, which opened in Bow Street in 1881, closed in 1992 and the adjoining Bow Street Magistrates' Court heard its last case on 14 July 2006.[50] The oldest operational police station in London is in Wapping, which opened in 1908. It is the headquarters of the marine policing unit (formerly known as Thames Division), which is responsible for policing the River Thames. It also houses a mortuary and the River Police Museum.
Most police stations can easily be identified from one or more blue lamps located outside the entrance, which were introduced in 1861.
In addition to the headquarters at New Scotland Yard, there are 140 police stations in London.[49] These range from large borough headquarters staffed around the clock every day to smaller stations, which may be open to the public only during normal business hours, or on certain days of the week.
The following table shows the percentage detection rates for the Metropolitan Police by offence group for 2010/11.[48]
Crimes reported within the Metropolitan Police District, selected by quarter centuries.[47]
In 2011/12, the MPS had a total expenditure of £3,692m, of which £2,754m went on pay.[46]
Annual expenditure for single years, selected by quarter centuries.[45]
A marine policing unit operates 22 vessels from its base in Wapping.
An air support unit operates three Eurocopter EC 145 helicopters, using the call signs India 97, India 98 and India 99. The helicopters are marked in police livery and used for a range of operations. They each cost £5.2 million and have a service life of ten years, meaning they will become due for replacement in 2017.
The majority of vehicles have a service life of three to five years; the Met replaces or upgrades between 800 and 1,000 vehicles each year.
The Met operates and maintains a fleet of more than 8,000 vehicles,[43] which are used for a range of duties, including:[44]
Uniformed traffic wardens, who wear a uniform with yellow and black markings, are a distinct body from local council civil enforcement officers. The former have greater powers that include being able to stop vehicles and redirect traffic at an incident.[24]
Metropolitan Police employees consist of uniformed police officers, special constables, civilian staff, and police community support officers.[23] The Met was the first force to introduce PCSOs.
The prefix "Woman" in front of female officers' ranks has been obsolete since 1999. Members of the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) up to and including the rank of Chief Superintendent prefix their ranks with "Detective". Detective ranks are equivalent in rank to their uniform counterparts. Other departments, such as Special Branch and Child Protection, award non-detectives "Branch Detective" status, allowing them to use the "Detective" prefix. None of these detective ranks confer on the holder any extra pay or supervisory authority compared to their uniformed colleagues.
The Met also has several active Volunteer Police Cadet units, which maintain their own internal rank structure.[22] The Metropolitan Special Constabulary (MSC) is a contingent of part-time volunteer police officers and is attached to most Borough Operational Command Units. The MSC has its own internal rank structure.
The Met uniformed officer rank structure, with shoulder badge features, is as follows:
Following controversy over assaults by uniformed officers with concealed shoulder identification numbers[20] during the G20 summit, Commissioner Sir Paul Stephenson said, "the public has a right to be able to identify any uniformed officer whilst performing their duty" by their shoulder identification numbers.[21]
The Met approved the use of name badges in October 2003, with new recruits wearing the Velcro badges from September 2004. The badge consists of the wearer's rank, followed by their surname.[19]
The Metropolitan Police Service uses the standard British police ranks, indicated by shoulder boards, up to Chief Superintendent, but uniquely has five ranks above that level instead of the standard three; namely Commander, Deputy Assistant Commissioner, Assistant Commissioner, Deputy Commissioner and Commissioner.[18] All senior officers above the rank of Commander are chief police officers of ACPO rank.
In June 2015, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe, said there was some justification in claims that the Metropolitan Police Service is institutionally racist.[17]
Each is overseen by an Assistant Commissioner, or in the case of administrative departments, a director of police staff, which is the equivalent civilian staff grade. The management board is made up of the Commissioner, Deputy Commissioner, Assistant Commissioners and Directors.
The Metropolitan Police Service is organised into the following directorates:
Metropolitan Police officers have legal jurisdiction throughout all of England and Wales, including areas that have their own special police forces, such as the Ministry of Defence, as do all police officers of territorial police forces. Officers also have limited powers in Scotland and Northern Ireland. Within the MPD, the Met will take over the investigation of any serious crime from the British Transport Police and Ministry of Defence Police, if it is deemed appropriate. Terrorist incidents and complex murder enquiries will almost always be investigated by the Met, with the assistance of any relevant specialist force, even if they are committed on railway or Ministry of Defence property. (A minor oddity to the normal jurisdiction of territorial police officers in England and Wales is that Met officers involved in the protection duties of the Royal Family and other VIPs have full police powers in Scotland and Northern Ireland in connection with those duties.)
It should be noted that, despite these specialist police forces, the Met is statutorily responsible for law and order throughout the MPD and can take on primacy of any incident or investigation within it.
The English part of the Royal Parks Constabulary, which patrolled a number of Greater London's major parks, was merged with the Metropolitan Police in 2004, and those parks are now policed by the Royal Parks Operational Command Unit.[15] There is also a small park police force, the Kew Constabulary, responsible for the Royal Botanic Gardens, whose officers have full police powers within the park. A few London borough councils maintain their own borough park constabularies, though their remit only extends to park by-laws, and although they are sworn as constables under laws applicable to parks, their powers are not equal to those of constables appointed under the Police Acts, meaning that they are not police officers.[16]
The British Transport Police are responsible for policing of the rail network in the United Kingdom, including London. Within London, they are also responsible for the policing of the London Underground, Tramlink, The Emirates Air Line (cable car) and the Docklands Light Railway.[14]
The Ministry of Defence Police are responsible for policing of Ministry of Defence property throughout the United Kingdom, including its headquarters in Whitehall and other MoD establishments across the MPD.[13]
The area policed by the Metropolitan Police Service is known as the Metropolitan Police District (MPD). In terms of geographic policing, the Met is divided into a number of Borough Operational Command Units, which directly align with the 32 London boroughs covered. The City of London (which is not a London borough) is a separate police area and is the responsibility of the separate City of London Police.
Since January 2012, the Mayor of London is responsible for the governance of the Metropolitan Police through the Mayor's Office for Policing and Crime (MOPAC). The mayor is able to appoint to act on his behalf; the current office-holder is Stephen Greenhalgh. The work of MOPAC is scrutinised by the Police and Crime Committee (also known as a police and crime panel) of the London Assembly. These structures were created by the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Act 2011 and replaced the Metropolitan Police Authority appointed board created in 2000 by Greater London Authority Act 1999.
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St Paul's Cathedral, Greater London, City of Westminster, Roman Empire, World War II
Labour Party (UK), Conservative Party (UK), Green Party of England and Wales, London, Greater London
United Kingdom, City of London, Paris, Greater London, Australia
London, David Cameron, Mayor of London, London Assembly, Law enforcement in the United Kingdom
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Wellington, Auckland, Christchurch, North Shore City, Hamilton, New Zealand
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