Priti Patel
(Picture: Parliament TV)There have been too many instances of appalling conduct in policing, the Home Secretary has said, after a damning report revealed racism, sexism and homophobia within the Met Police.
Shocking examples of rape ‘jokes’, racist language, bullying and harassment were uncovered in a report issued by the Independent Office for Police Conduct on Tuesday, mainly centred around officers at Charing Cross Police Station.
However, the report said it believed “these incidents are not isolated or simply the behaviour of a few bad apples” and issued the force with 15 recommendations to totally overhaul its culture.
Asked whether the report showed a need for an inquiry into misogyny in the police, Priti Patel told MPs on Wednesday there had been a “failure of leadership” in some quarters of policing.
“There are problems with the culture and some of the aspects of the culture within the Metropolitan Police,” she said.
“I touched on this last year, specifically around what was a very difficult and appalling and sad time post the murder of Sarah Everard, that also exposed a range of issues”.
She declined to commit to a McPherson-style inquiry into institutional misogyny in policing, but added she wouldn’t rule out further measures.
“We’re not seeing one-off incidents, I think we should be quite clear about that, it’s not isolated,” she said.
“We have seen now too many instances where in policing we just see the most appalling behaviours, the most appalling conduct. I also think it shows a failure of leadership in some quarters”.
The IOPC’s regional director for London said Wednesday the two Met officers sacked over the vile messages were the "worst perpetrators" - but did not confirm whether any others responsible for the comments are still serving.
Sal Naseem said a lack of supervision from senior officers in the Met allowed a "really, really toxic culture" to "grow and ultimately fester".
He told LBC that victims came forward despite "fear of reprisal" to share examples of "the worst kind of discrimination you can possibly imagine".
"We wanted to lift the lid and demonstrate to the public and to serving police officers what canteen culture actually looks like," he said.
"It was actually victims that started coming forward, and that one independent investigation mushroomed into nine separate independent investigations."
Labour's shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper said the report had uncovered "truly appalling behaviour" and urged the government to address issues in policing.
She told the BBC's Today programme: "Officers talking and joking about raping or beating their wives, and using homophobic insults and awful racism - you cannot ever tolerate this kind of abuse, racism or misogyny, it must have no place in policing and be rooted out."
Scotland Yard has said it had already taken a number of steps and that an independent review by Baroness Louise Casey is being conducted into its culture and ethics.
Commander Bas Javid said: “I am angry and disappointed to see officers involved in sharing sexist, racist and discriminatory messages.
“It’s clear we have a lot of work to do to ensure bullying and discrimination does not exist in any part of the Met.”
