Police monitoring groups across London have criticised the Metropolitan Police as a ‘lost cause’ as levels of community trust in the institution decline across the capital.
Recent data from the Mayors Office has revealed that the number of people in London who agree that the police are dealing with things that matter to the community has fallen by over 20% in the past five years.
Levels of trust in the police’s reliability have fallen by 10% in the same period, while the amount of people who agree that the police listen to the concerns of local residents fell by 15%.
However, there was a marginal uptick in the amount of people who agree that the police treat everyone fairly regardless of identity in recent years, increasing from 62% in September 2024 to 66% in September 2025.
A spokesperson for UK Copwatch said: “Amongst many communities in London – especially Global Majority and working class communities, the police have never had a positive reputation to begin with.
“The past, present and future of policing is built on violence, and was always a lost cause.
“Over £1bn is spent on policing in London alone – imagine if even half of that was used to benefit communities, especially as poverty continues to increase.”
Public trust in the Metropolitan Police has been badly impacted by recent scandals, such as the sacking of officer Jayson Lynch for inappropriately touching female officers in January.
More broadly, these include the murder of Sarah Everard by Met Police officer Wayne Cousins in 2021 and the 363-page report by Baroness Louise Casey – which found that the Met was “institutionally racist, sexist and homophobic” – in 2023.
The murder of Sarah Everard was integral to the formation of Lambeth Copwatch in South London, who said that – along with the Black Lives Matter protests in 2020 – these events have contributed to a perception that the police do not protect communities, and can often be “the root cause of lack of safety”.
The spokesperson continued: “This decline in their reputation is evidence of more and more people becoming affected by the oppressive nature of the police force.
“Policing has become more present in our daily lives, from campaigns such as Clear Hold Build which increase violent arrests and police harassment in our neighbourhoods and live facial recognition vans surveilling our every day.
“Policing does not and cannot build safe communities.
“It simply entrenches racialised targeting, criminalisation of poverty, further erosion of trust, and the embedding of police power in spaces where it does not belong.
“True community safety will never come from more officers, more powers, or more surveillance.”
The Metropolitan police were contacted for comment.
Featured image credit: Bob Jenkins via Pexels
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