Ex-senior cop says Cressida Dick 'buried her head in the sand' over state of the Met Police
17 March 2023, 11:16
Parm Sandhu on Cressida Dick and Met Police
‘She just wanted to bury her head, and she did’: Former Chief Superintendent Parm Sandhu tells Nick Ferrari about the state of the Met police under Cressida Dick ahead of the Casey report’s publication.
Ex-top cop Parm Sandhu tells Nick Ferrari at Breakfast about the degradation of the Met police under Cressida Dick, who when confronted on her failings simply “turned her back and walked away.”
This comes ahead of Baroness Casey’s report being published on Tuesday, in which the Metropolitan Police is expected to be heavily criticised for being racist, sexist and homophobic.
Nick asked Parm Sandhu: "Is this the MacPherson moment?", referencing the report published in 1999 by Sir William MacPherson looking into the failings that helped the racist killers of Stephen Lawrence avoid justice for so long and identified institutional racism in the Met.
Ms. Sandhu responded plainly: “It is and I actually said to the commissioner in 2019 that she had taken us back to pre-Macpherson, so yes this is that moment again.” She added: “This really cannot be ignored.”
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The interim Casey review, published in October, found that hundreds of Met officers had been breaking the law and facing no consequences. The interim review also found that many claims of sexual misconduct, misogyny, racism, and homophobia had been badly mishandled.
Nick then asked Ms. Sandhu: “When you told her that she’d taken the force back to pre-Macpherson how did she respond?”, prompting the answer: “She turned her back on me and walked away.”
The Chief Superintendent then elaborated: “I expected to get a dressing down for saying that in front of lots of people, but I didn’t” adding: “She just wanted to bury her head and she did.”
Ms. Sandhu pointed to the extent of the misconduct within the Met Police saying: “Sexism doesn’t walk alone, homophobia doesn’t walk alone.”
As well as the Casey review the Metropolitan Police is already facing a separate independent inquiry into how Wayne Couzens and David Carrick were able to become policemen and were at no point identified as threats to women.
