Britain’s most senior police officer says violence against women and girls should be considered a threat to national security and policing it should be funded on the same level as the fight against terrorism.
Sir Mark Rowley told the London Policing Board on Tuesday, “The aim nationally should be to treat it as a national security threat like we treat organised crime, like we treat terrorism.”
“When you look at the amount of harm that predatory men create in communities and to individuals, that’s what it deserves,” he added.
His comments came as one of the most senior judges in England and Wales announced plans to deal with a backlog of rape trials.
Sir Mark said hundreds of thousands of men in Britain were a threat to women and girls.
Estimated 750,000 Men Pose Threat to Children
The Crime Survey of England and Wales suggested 800,000 women were sexually assaulted every year and the National Crime Agency estimates there are 750,000 men who pose a sexual threat to children.
Sir Mark said, “You start to add these numbers together. There are a lot of men who are a threat to women and children.”
He said the Met was making progress by being “clever” and “better organised” but he added, “We’re going to need the support of future governments to really build the scale of resource to deal with this problem across the country that is the same kind of resource that you have proportionately to deal with, say, terrorism and organised crime.”
Last month another Metropolitan police officer, Cliff Mitchell, was convicted of a series of rapes. Mitchell only joined the force in 2021, after the murder of Ms. Everard, and has already been sacked ahead of his sentencing in May.
The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, told Tuesday’s meeting, “Knowing that a police officer harboured the capacity for such sadistic violence still haunts our city. It’s a perpetual reminder of why we’re here and the importance of this board.”
On Wednesday Lord Justice Edis, a Court of Appeal judge who presides over crown courts, announced plans to tackle the backlog of rape trials in England and Wales.
‘Unacceptable State of Affairs’
Lord Justice Edis told reporters, “This is an unacceptable state of affairs from the point of view of the complainants, the witnesses, the defendants, and justice generally.”“The system suffered some shocks over the past four years because of the pandemic, we didn’t used to have this problem, and the current situation is the product of those shocks,” he added.
He said some of 181 cases were very complex, while others were awaiting a retrial or had been delayed for a variety of reasons.
Lord Justice Edis said, “While such waiting times are rare, it is unacceptable to have this many rape cases still in the system after more than two years leaving the lives of complainants, witnesses and defendants on hold.”
As of January 2024, there were 3,355 rape trials pending in England and Wales.
Shadow justice secretary Shabana Mahmood welcomed the move by the judiciary but said, “The reality is that they have had to step in to fix the Conservatives’ mess. It’s ultimately the responsibility of government to ensure a functional criminal justice system, and their abysmal failure has led to a record backlog of cases.”
The leader of the Labour Party, Sir Keir Starmer, told Parliament on Wednesday the Angiolini inquiry report exposed an “appalling failure in police vetting” and added, “I am very troubled by its conclusion that there is ‘nothing to stop another Couzens operating in plain sight.’ How can that be the case three years on from this horrendous crime?”
The prime minister, Rishi Sunak, said action had been taken to strengthen police vetting and he added, “We are now ensuring that any officer who has been charged for a crime will be suspended from duty automatically until their case has concluded and we will thoroughly consider all of the report’s recommendations and respond in full.”
