THE SHAMING OF SCOTLAND YARD
Scathing ‘Nick’ report says Met is more interested in covering up mistakes than learning from them
SCOTLAND Yard chiefs were more concerned with ‘restricting access’ to a damning judge-led report into the VIP child sex abuse scandal than learning lessons from it, according to police watchdogs.
The Metropolitan Police’s shocking response to its disastrous ‘Nick’ inquiry is laid bare in a devastating report by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary today.
It revealed the force did little to improve practices for nearly three years, training regimes were outdated and nearly half of officers polled in a survey had received no training on how to apply for warrants.
‘Inexperienced supervisors, weaknesses in understanding, inconsistencies and a superficial approach to supervising crime investigations aren’t the most promising findings to have to report,’ the HMIC said.
On another day of shame for the Metro
politan Police over the ‘ Nick’ affair, the inspectorate report said senior officers largely ignored criticisms made by retired High Court judge Sir Richard Henriques in a 2016 review.
His dossier identified 43 major blunders in the inquiry – known as Operation Midland – and made 25 recommendations.
The HMIC inspection found the Metropolitan Police had ‘ initially not done enough to learn the lessons from the Henriques report’. ‘There were things the Met could and should have done when it received the report on October 31 2016. However, the force only properly began implementing the recommended changes much more recently,’ it added.
Former Tory MP Harvey Proctor, falsely accused of being a child sex killer by serial liar ‘Nick’, real name Carl Beech, said today’s report ‘ clearly indicates the Met tried to cover-up its wrongdoings in Operation Midland’.
The HMIC inquiry was instigated by Home Secretary Priti Patel last October after the Daily Mail led the way in exposing the scandal of the ‘Nick’ affair after Beech was jailed for 18 years for his VIP abuse lies and other offences.
Its bombshell findings raise questions about the leadership of Metropolitan Police Commissioner Dame Cressida Dick, who took over the force in early 2017 in the wake of the Henriques report.
HMIC inspectors examined a summary of the minutes of 16 ‘gold group’ meetings of senior officers at the Met which took place between February 2018 to August last year.
Its report stated: ‘ We were left with the impression that the group saw no particular role for itself in overseeing implementation of the recommendations or ensuring that the Met had learned the wider lessons. The discussion was heavily weighted towards restricting access to the report, rather than learning the lessons from it.’ It said it believes it would have been ‘appropriate for the force to carry out some form of review into its use of search warrants’ while a police watchdog investigation into the conduct of five Midland officers was under way. HMIC investigators reviewed 61 search warrant applications which suggested that some officers making applications to raid properties still do not understand what they should disclose to courts.
Just under half (48 per cent) of 1,700 police officers who responded to a survey said they had never had any training in how to apply for a search warrant. The HMIC added: ‘Some officers told us the focus was on increasing the number of search warrants executed rather than improving the quality of the applications.’
HM Inspector of Constabulary Matt Parr said: ‘The Henriques report made uncomfortable reading for the Met and the force has been slow to learn the lessons.’
However, he added: ‘I’m pleased to see that, since October 2019, the force has been taking bolder steps to learn the lessons.’
A redacted copy of the Henriques report was first released in November 2016, with the Metropolitan Police publishing a much fuller version in October last year, prompting the HMIC inquiry.
In July last year Sir Richard used an article for the Mail to accuse Midland officers of using false evidence to obtain warrants for raids on the homes of leading figures accused by Beech.
Among those falsely accused by the former nurse were retired Armed Forces chief Lord Bramall, former home secretary Lord Brittan and Mr Proctor.
Scotland Yard said yesterday that it noted the criticism in the inspectorate report that ‘despite some initial good work, more could have been done after Sir Richard’s report was received’.
‘However, the Met was deliberately cautious so as not to impact on the ongoing criminal investigations into Carl Beech by Northumbria Police or the independent investigation by the Independent Office for Police Conduct into the conduct of our officers,’ it added.