Patrick Christys: If Cressida Dick was in any other job, she'd be asked to move on

When it comes to Met Police chief Cressida Dick, ironically there’s no justice. Cressida Dick was supposed to go, she was supposed to be put out to pasture but instead we are lumbered with her for another two years.

Apparently Boris Johnson and Priti Patel weren’t impressed with the other candidates. Which is pretty concerning.

I refuse to believe Cressida Dick is the best we’ve got. What’s she actually done?

There’s an argument that she should never have got the job in the first place. In 2014 as an assistant commissioner she was in charge of the team involved in Operation Midland - the disastrous long-running inquiry into an alleged VIP paedophile ring. When Midland collapsed and the complainant, Carl Beech, was exposed as a serial liar, criticism was levelled at a number of officers including one detective who had initially described Beech's story as "credible and true".

Cressida Dick admitted that she had heard the officer say this on the radio and had done nothing to correct it.

July 22, 2005: She is the gold commander of an armed terror operation in wake of London bombings which mistakenly shot dead Brazilian electrician Jean Charles de Menezes in Stockwell Tube station. Met guilty of errors including an 'utterly chaotic' control room. She is exonerated.

2008: Sir Ian Blair, her mentor, sacked by London mayor Boris Johnson after a string of cock-ups.

2010: Receives the Queen's Police Medal, naturally. And then she got a damehood.

There’s an ongoing knife crime epidemic that shows no signs of stopping, the police’s response to several high profile events has, arguably, been completely wrong.

Extinction Rebellion protesters have been allowed to bring the capital city to a standstill, block ambulances from getting to hospitals and commit rampant criminal damage.

At one of the larger protests last year, people were being arrested, charged, and then simply allowed to go back to the protests and crack on again.

The response to the Sarah Everard vigil was catastrophic. The images of police trampling on the backs of women they’d pinned to the ground simply because they wanted to pay their respects to a woman who was killed by a serving Metropolitan police officer.

Some police have routinely misinterpreted the Coronavirus Act which has led to many convictions being overturned. Ultimately she has to carry some of the blame for that.

If Cressida Dick was in any other job, I think she’d probably be asked to move on.

If she really is the best we’ve got then there’s a much bigger issue at play here – the issue of a clear fundamental lack of quality and competence in our police force.