Blair rages against Boris and politics
Monday, 2 November 2009 12:00 AM
By Ian Dunt
Sir Ian Blair has spoken out about the decision of Boris Johnson to remove him as chief of Scotland Yard.
Doing a round of media interviews as he gears up for the publication of his memoirs, the former Metropolitan Police Commissioner said the decision to get rid of him was the result of a turf war between the mayor of London and David Cameron.
"I do think it's something to do with the fact he wanted to show the power of the London mayoralty," he said on the Andrew Marr show yesterday.
"What Boris did was to introduce the American system where chiefs come and go at the behest of the mayor. He just did that and I think that's quite a dangerous thing to do.
"I raise the possibility that it was part of the Dave and Boris issue, but what I do know is that what happened has dangerous implications for the future of policing," he continued.
"There is a system in which the chief officers are appointed, they have got disciplinary processes, they have got conduct processes, they are operationally independent.
"If at a stroke they can be removed then the system is being changed."
Sir Ian described Tory plans for elected police chiefs as "ill thought out and historically ignorant" but he also attacked the continued "politicisation" of the police under the current government and suggested a new review needed to take a long term view of the role of policing in the UK.
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