Three years on from the murder of Sarah Everard

 

Farah Nazeer, chief executive at Women’s Aid, comments:  

“Today marks three years since the murder of Sarah Everard, with the first findings of the inquiry report looking at the missed opportunities to stop her murderer, former police officer, Wayne Couzens, published only days before. The inquiry, led by Dame Elish Angiolini, has revealed numerous issues within the system – from vetting failures, through to not taking crimes like indecent exposure seriously. 

 

“As Dame Elish has highlighted, policing must urgently grip the full the extent of the entrenched cultural problems and restore the confidence of women, which is at an all-time low. Immediate steps must be taking to improve recruitment, vetting and misconduct policies to ensure that those who pose a danger to women never hold positions of trust and power.  

“The first thing that needs to take place is a complete cultural overhaul, a clear vision for policing which centres women, children and communities, it means the right people in the right jobs, and critically, it means transparency, clear reporting, accountability and consequence for those who do meet the highest standards.  

“For this change to happen and for the culture of the force to improve, it is essential that the Metropolitan police works with organisations like Women’s Aid when shaping their culture and determining the type of training they choose. Training clearly cannot default to what has been, it cannot be comfortable or cosy, it needs to provocative and challenging. It needs to be sensitive to the nature of violence against women, with the experiences of survivors front and centre of the approach. We cannot afford to have tick-box, inconsistent training.  Domestic abuse is an issue literally every officer needs training on – and this training needs to be effective and ongoing.  

“I urge the Government to act now. We need real accountability for reform within policing so that women and children are safe from those who seek to cause them harm and that police officers whose duty it is to protect them, do their jobs with care, consideration and diligence, so that horrific murders like Sarah’s never happen again.”