Strewth! Will the next Met chief be from Down Under?
Patel ‘actively looking’ to Australia for a new broom to clean up force
PRITI Patel is scouring Australia for Cressida Dick’s replacement.
The Home Secretary has extended the search for Britain’s next Metropolitan Police commissioner Down Under after concluding that an outsider may be needed to break the culture blamed for a series of scandals.
Dame Cressida was recently granted a two-year extension on her contract, despite widespread calls for her to go. Government sources said the decision reflected a lack of suitable replacements, with one saying it was ‘a case of better the devil you know’.
However, some senior Tories believe Dame Cressida could still be forced out early if Scotland Yard is hit by another scandal.
By convention, the Metropolitan Police commissioner is drawn from the ranks of serving senior officers in the UK.
But Home Office officials have identified a loophole in the law which allows for the recruitment of senior officers from the United States and certain Commonwealth countries, including Canada and Australia.
Home Office sources confirmed that Miss Patel is ‘actively looking’ at recruiting Britain’s next top police officer from Australia. One said: ‘The problem with senior police [here] is that they all sound the same and think the same. If you want to change the culture – and we do – you might need someone from outside.’
A second source said that Australia’s membership of the Five Eyes security network put them in ‘a very good place’ for compatibility with UK law enforcement. ‘They also have some very robust crime-fighting cops.’
Among those who have caught the eye of British ministers is Mick
Fuller, the commissioner of New South Wales Police, whose toughtalking style would chime with Miss Patel’s approach.
Mr Fuller has courted controversy, defending his force’s policy of strip-searching suspects by saying there needs to be ‘a little bit of fear’ of law enforcement.
‘People need to know there are consequences, especially those who are criminals or on the verge of being criminals,’ he said.
However, Mr Fuller has announced plans to retire next year, meaning the Home Office may have to look elsewhere unless he has a rethink.
Another likely candidate is Queensland police commissioner Katarina Carroll, who oversaw Australia’s biggest peacetime security operation at the G20 summit in Brisbane in 2014.
The former drug squad detective was drafted in to overhaul the troubled Queensland Fire and Emergency Service after it was hit by sexism and bullying scandals.
Her experience is likely to be of interest to ministers who want the next chief to address allegations that the force suffers from a culture of cover-ups and misogyny.
Speaking about her experience, she later said: ‘Jumping from an organisation I knew to one I didn’t know – with people who weren’t happy about me coming – was the toughest time of my career.
‘But all I could do was be honest and say, “we have to take this organisation forward together”.’
Other potential candidates include Reece Kershaw, who worked his way up the ranks to
‘We want to change the culture’
serve as commissioner of the Australian Federal Police since 2019, and Michael Outram, commissioner of the Australian Border Force who is a former detective chief inspector at the Met.
Former Australian police commissioner Andrew Colvin is another whose name has been mentioned. He transformed the service with new technologies and has considerable experience in dealing with terrorism, including the 2002 Bali bombings.
Ministers have not ruled out a British appointment but are unimpressed with the available candidates.