Commissioner outlines the Met’s plans for evidence-based policing

The Commissioner has set out how data, research and evidence will be the cornerstone of a modern approach to policing at the Met so that police officers are better able to tackle crime, keep people safe and build more trust.

Speaking at the international policing conference, ‘Exceptional Policing’ today, Sir Mark Rowley, outlined plans, which include:

• using data to rebuild trust with communities by being more transparent about the information the Met holds and how it uses it; and by analysing public opinion data to ensure it is on the road to rebuilding trust.
  
• Exploring how the Met could use precision data analytics to better understand and reduce high-harm crimes, including building a sophisticated city-wide data picture of predatory men who commit violent crime against women and girls.
  
• Exploring how tactics already used successfully in counter terrorism policing could work for other crime types: whether threats and crimes against women and girls can be triaged and treated in the systemic way in which terrorism threats and crimes have been.
  
• Going further, the Met hopes to identify who is most likely to commit further crime to enable early interventions that keep people safer.
  
• Using evidence to uphold high standards and performance by constantly checking the workings of the Met “like an airline examines every airplane”; an intensive quality control procedure that has begun with the launch of a new proactive Anti-Corruption and Abuse Command.

The Commissioner was joined as a keynote speaker by Professor Lawrence Sherman, who he appointed as the Met’s first ever Chief Science Officer and who today highlighted the importance of the Met putting scientific evidence at the core of its operating model.

Professor Sherman has trained police officers across the world in evidence-based policing, and in his new role will be dedicated to bringing his wealth of experience to the Met and the Commissioner’s ambitious plans for the organisation.

The Conference of the Global Collaboration of Evidence Based Policing is a 24-hour event bringing together world-leading criminologists, academic thinkers and police professionals to look at the role that evidence, its legitimacy, and policing leadership have in everyday policing.

This year is the first time the conference has taken place.

Further information:

A transcript of the Commissioner’s speech is available for download here: https://mps.box.com/s/a3otetxqrqxu0plgr557rqsv5yjhx3ye.

A video of the Commissioner’s speech, for media use, will be made available in this location as soon as possible.