Met chief: We must rebuild trust in police

More needs to be done to boost trust in the police, Scotland yard chief Dame Cressida Dick admitted yesterday.

She spoke out as her force faces a crisis in public confidence following the murder of Sarah everard allegedly at the hands of a serving Met officer.

Dame Cressida is also under pressure following the ugly scenes at the vigil for Miss everard in Clapham, london, earlier this month. Speaking of the need to improve trust, particularly in ethnic minority communities, she said: ‘We have made a lot of progress over many years but there is much more to be done.

‘I recognise trust in the Met is still too low in some black communities... I feel very sorry about that. It is something I have worked to change and I commit now to stepping up that work further.’ but Dame Cressida was also criticised yesterday by the mother of two murdered sisters.

The Venerable Mina Smallman, the first black archdeacon in the Church of england, claimed police were slow to investigate her daughters’ disappearance because they were black.

And she told Dame Cressida: ‘Stop protecting the police and start protecting the people that you are appointed to protect... That’s your job. Do your job.’

Bibaa Henry, 46, and 27-year- old Nicole Smallman were stabbed to death in Wembley, north-west london, in June last year.

Mrs Smallman believes the investigation into her missing daughters was less extensive because of assumptions about a ‘black woman who lives on a council estate’.

Two Met officers are under investigation for allegedly sharing grotesque selfies of the sisters’ bodies.

A petition calling for the resignation of the Met chief reached 8,700 signatures yesterday.

‘There is much more to be done’