Police and Crime Commissioner for Cambridgeshire, Darryl Preston, has responded to a damning review about misconduct issues by serving officers in the Metropolitan force.

He said it was "extremely upsetting" to hear that standards had fallen so low and admitted it was "not uniquely a problem for London".

"Poor behaviour of officers occurs throughout the country, impacting our communities and undermining the commitment of the vast majority of the workforce in keeping us safe," he said.

"That is why in Cambridgeshire and Peterborough, increased investment is helping the Constabulary weed out officers falling short of the standards expected of them."

Last week, Mr Preston visited the team responsible for protecting standards across the Constabulary to see how increased investment and innovation is driving up performance.

He visited Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Hertfordshire constabularies’ Professional Standards Department (PSD) to understand how the Government’s national Uplift Programme and increased investment from the money local people are paying towards policing in 2022/23 has boosted resources and secured additional investigators.

During an inspection to the Counter Corruption Unit (CCU) in September 2021, Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services (HMICFRS) described the unit as ‘on the way to becoming one of the best CCUs in the country’.

Mr Preston said: “The majority of officers who join the constabulary want to do the right thing and keep people safe. However, as with any large organisation, there will always be those who sign up for the wrong reasons and it is vital we have robust systems in place to weed them out.

"Where officers are proven to have been behaving inappropriately the constabulary robustly deals with them, and this rightly includes dismissal.

“I am pleased the new resources are helping the team to work more preventatively to stop issues escalating before they damage public confidence. The public must be able to trust the police to do a good job and act ethically, otherwise they will not support their work upholding the law in our communities.”

DCS Martin Brunning, head of professional standards, added: “Maintaining and enhancing the public’s confidence in policing is my absolute priority.

"The expansion of the functions within PSD have enabled proactive work to identify threats posed by individuals and mitigate and remove those risks.

"The dedicated people who fearlessly route out wrongdoing within PSD do so because it is vital work and they recognise how important their role is for the public and policing.”