Concept

Metropolitan Police

Overview

The Metropolitan Police Service (MPS), commonly known as the Metropolitan Police, Met Police, or the "Met", is the territorial police force responsible for law enforcement and crime prevention within Greater London. In addition, it is responsible for specialised tasks throughout the United Kingdom, such as dealing with counter-terrorism throughout the UK, and the protection of certain individuals, including the monarch, royal family, governmental officials, and other designated figures. It is also referred to as an eponym as "Scotland Yard" or "the Yard", after the location of its original headquarters in Great Scotland Yard, Whitehall, in the 19th century. The Met is presently headquartered at New Scotland Yard, in a building situated on the Victoria Embankment.

The main geographical area covered by the Met, the Metropolitan Police District, consists of the 32 London boroughs, and excludes the square mile of the City of London – a largely non-residential and financial district, overseen by the City of London Police. As the force responsible for the majority of the UK's capital, the Met has significant responsibilities and unique challenges, such as protecting 164 foreign embassies and High Commissions, policing London City and Heathrow airports, protecting the Palace of Westminster, and managing a higher volume of protests and events than any other British police force, with 3,500 such events in 2016.

The force, by officer numbers, ranks as the largest police force within the United Kingdom. Excluding its national roles, the Met oversees the eighth-smallest primary geographic area (police area) compared to other territorial police forces in the UK.

The force operates under the leadership of the Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis, directly accountable to the mayor of London, through the Mayor's Office for Policing and Crime and the Home Office. The post of commissioner was first held jointly by Sir Charles Rowan and Sir Richard Mayne, with Sir Mark Rowley currently holding the position since July 2022.

Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).

Possible passages

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The practice of military exercises is only the occasional occupation of the soldiers of a militia, and they derive the principal and ordinary fund of their subsistence from some other occupation. In a militia, the character of the labourer, artificer, or tradesman, predominates over that of the soldier; in a standing army, that of the soldier predominates over every other character; and in this distinction seems to…
Adam Smith, An Inquiry Into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations
Close in meaning to Metropolitan Police; the term itself is not named.
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Military expenditure has to cover not only the needs of defence against foreign aggression, but also the possibilities of internal unrest and rebellion. Police charges have to go beyond the prevention and deletion of ordinary crime, for though this would be the only expenditure over the police of a self-governing people where any nation governs another, a large chapter of artificial crime has to be added to the…
Mahatma Gandhi, Freedom's Battle Being a Comprehensive Collection of Writings and Speeches on the Present Situation
Close in meaning to Metropolitan Police; the term itself is not named.
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But besides all these magistrates there is one who is supreme over them all, who very often has in his own power the disposal of the public revenue and taxes; who presides over the people when the supreme power is in them; for there must be some magistrate who has a power to summon them together, and to preside as head of the state. These are sometimes called preadvisers; but where there are many, more properly a…
Aristotle, Politics
Close in meaning to Metropolitan Police; the term itself is not named.
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Related ideas

Place in the tradition

Part of Liberalism.

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