Met Police: Poll highlights extent of public distrust in force

Public confidence in the Met Police has been shattered, a poll commissioned by BBC London has found.

Out of more than 1,000 Londoners surveyed, nearly three-quarters felt officers treated some parts of society differently to others.

Almost half of female respondents said they distrusted the Met to varying degrees after numerous controversies involving some of its officers.

The Met's commissioner said he was "confident" about reforming the force.

The poll, conducted by YouGov, quizzed 1,051 adults and was weighted and representative of all Londoners.

It followed last month's Casey report which laid bare the discrimination deeply entrenched in the force's culture, as well as other crises which have hit the Met such as the murder of Sarah Everard.

Of all those questioned for the survey, 42% said they "strongly" or "somewhat" distrusted the Met, while this was 47% for female respondents.

Among those to have lost faith in Scotland Yard is 44-year-old Tashmia Owen, who contacted the force after she was sexually assaulted by two people in November 2020.

She said it had taken her "a huge amount of a courage" to report the attack as "my family have not had good experiences with the police in the past... and I was looking for ways to get out of it.

"But my friends convinced me that I should report it and it was the right thing to do."

After initially speaking to supportive officers, she was referred to a detective who called her a liar and she found to be "confrontational", "antagonistic" and "accusatory."

"He referred to it as a 'feud' and that he was very busy and didn't have time for it. He shouted and swore at me, I just sat there crying," she said.

After a year-long ordeal, her case was eventually dismissed.

Londoners taking part in the survey also believed there was discrimination in the Met, with 73% saying they believed officers treated some people in society differently to others.

Some 43% also said they regarded the force more negatively than they did 12 months ago, with many saying evidence of racism in the force had affected their opinion.

Kai, 17, joined Voyage, a Hackney-based charity which educates young people about their rights in fighting racism and discrimination, as a result of having previous bad experiences with police.

On one occasion he was watching a play at The Globe theatre with his mother when he found himself being confronted by an off-duty officer in the audience who said his mother's bag had touched the officer's back.

"He threatened to arrest me while he was off-duty, he turned around and flashed his badge at me. When I tried to see his badge again to report him, he refused," he said.

It was not the first time Kai was confronted by police. When he was just 15 he was questioned by officers as he waited outside a shop for a friend.

Reuben, another member of the charity, said he had also been stopped by police for "looking suspicious". In his case, it was for simply being dressed all in black while riding his bike, when he was aged 16.

"As I saw the police van approaching, I was preparing what I was going to say so that I wouldn't appear as someone aggressive or who wants to make trouble," he said.

He explained he used the knowledge he gained from Voyage to tell the officers "if they had further questions, I had to be accompanied by an adult, and they left me alone", but he remains daunted about any further interactions with officers.

"I feel that trusting the police is really difficult thing for me to do, because I feel like if I get the wrong officer, the problem won't be solved," he said.

Thirteen-year-old Betsy, who is also a member of Voyage, believes black people are particularly singled out "because of what we're wearing, and we feel like we can't really say anything otherwise they'll take it as aggressive".

"For people of different ethnicities, I don't think there is a lot of trust," she added.

The force's commissioner, Sir Mark Rowley, has vowed to reform the service with dedicated funding from the mayor and a range of new training for current and joining officers.

Yet when asked whether respondents were confident the commissioner could successfully reform the Met, 63% said they were not.

Former Met Police officer Erol Patterson, who worked for 11 years in the Lambeth area, told the BBC he did "not have any faith at all" in the commissioner's pledges to reform.

"Sir Mark comes from the same barrel as the others. Every time a new commissioner comes they say the same thing. The MPS is too big to reform and old practices are too engrained, it's become a gentleman's club and it's not fit for purpose," he said.

He believes the force needs to be changed radically for any real difference to be made.

"The only way to get true accountability is to divide it up or get more commissioners. I know other former officers feel equally as disillusioned with it, it's no longer community-focused and more politicised," he said.

Responding to the survey, Commissioner Sir Mark told BBC London: "I said we were serious about delivering higher standards and rooting out those who corrupt our integrity and I meant it.

"This is the strongest doubling down on standards in the Met for 50 years."

He continued: "Restoring public confidence is going to involve us removing the barriers to trust by getting rid of those officers who shouldn't be here and delivering higher standards, but it's also about building policing that works for Londoners.

"That's about reinvesting in neighbourhood policing, strengthening the way we work with communities to fight crime and improving our service to victims."

Sir Mark admitted "the challenges ahead of us are not simple, but we have tens of thousands of inspiring and hard-working officers and staff who will be determined and relentless in taking them on.

"I am confident we will succeed."

This was amended on 20 April to clarify that when referring to respondents who selected "distrust" of the Met, the percentage reflects those that selected "strongly" and "somewhat".

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