Archive for police

A clock

The Met Police: good news about the speaking clock, bad news about the speaking clock

18 January 2012 ,
The good news: the Met Police’s expenditure on phone calls to the speaking clock fell by 8.3% in the last year. The bad news: the Met still spent £16,879 on around 55,000 calls to the speaking clock. Hat-tip: Evening Standard
Jumbo jet

Met Police wastes money for business class on short-haul flights

4 January 2012 , ,
Good sleuthing by Liberal Democrat Assembly Member Dee Doocey has brought to light the large sums the Met Police is spending on sending its officers on  business class flights: Figures show that Met officers took 1,497 business class flights in the last financial year at a cost to the taxpayer of £2,675,768. A total of [...]

The Met Police have an unusual problem

10 December 2010 , ,
I suspect there are many parts of the public sector which wished they had this problem: Underspending continues to be an issue in the management of the capital programme, although unused funds can often be carried forward through reserves to support projects at a future date. Part of the issue is large projects slipping, with [...]

Government scraps target – Met Police sets up new committee

12 October 2010 , , , ,
You might have thought that scrapping central government targets would result in local bodies being able to cut at least some of their own monitoring and reporting setups. But in an Alice in Wonderland style twist, Home Secretary Theresa May’s decision to scrap the “confidence target” for the police has been followed by the Met [...]

Met Police and Home Office put on special measures for breaking rules

4 October 2010 , , , , ,
One for the bureaucratic irony files this. The Information Commissioner has announced that 33 public sector bodies have so regularly broken the rules on responding to Freedom of Information requests that they have been put in special measures. The 33 bodies are all being required to fully document how they handle future requests and report [...]

Welcome for plans to scale down police stop and search

8 July 2010 , , , ,
Commenting on the Home Secretary’s announcement that stop and search powers will be subject to stricter conditions, Tom Brake MP (Co-Chair of the Liberal Democrat Parliamentary Committee for Home Affairs, Justice and Equality) said: This is a very welcome announcement. Section 44 was an unreasonable power, applied in an indiscriminate way. This change strengthens our [...]

Warning: do not read this photography post if you are prone to dizziness

11 December 2009 , , ,
ITN film crew is stopped by police whilst filming in central London’s financial district, the City. So much, so usual as far as “police stop innocent, legitimate use of cameras” stories go. But in a touch of genius, it turns out that the ITN crew was filming a story … about someone who had three cars [...]