'Too little, too late!' Sadiq Khan slammed for 'pre-election gimmicks' as Mayor unveils fresh funding for Met Police
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Sadiq Khan has been accused of "pre-election gimmicks", after announcing £151 million extra funding for the Metropolitan Police.
Conservative Mayoral Candidate Susan Hall said the funding is "too little, too late", accusing him of offering "crumbs" to the police.
She also claimed he had "stashed away money" in previous years in order to spend it during election year.
This comes just five days after GB News revealed that the Mayor found an extra £66.5 million in the City Hall budget. The money was found in the income collected from business rates - which was higher than expected.
Sadiq Khan has been accused of "pre-election gimmicks", after announcing £151 million extra funding for the Metropolitan Police.
PA
Dubbing the money "secret cash", a Conservative Party source suggested the Mayor had been keeping back money from the budget in order to hand out more money ahead of the Mayoral elections in May.
Hitting out at today's police funding announcement, Hall told GB News: "After splashing out on pre-election gimmicks and a £30 million bung to stop his trade union bosses striking, Sadiq Khan has nothing but crumbs to offer the police.
"1,000 people have been killed on his watch and for every past or future victim of crime, this is too little, too late. London deserves better than a Mayor who stashes away money for his re-election bid, while ignoring a horrific crime wave happening on his watch.
"As Mayor, I will listen to Londoners and back our police, with a £200 million investment in making our streets safe."
City Hall pointed out that the additional funding means Khan has more than doubled - an increase of 103 per cent – the investment in policing and crime prevention from City Hall since he came to office.
Their analysis shows that Government funding for the Met will have fallen in real terms by a third, over £1billion, since 2010-11. Meanwhile the previous Mayor cut the Met funding in real terms by 28 per cent.
The Mayor’s final draft budget proposes £1.148 billion of funding for the Met in total for 2024-25.
Khan said: "Bearing down on crime and keeping Londoners safe is my top priority as Mayor. That’s why I’m proud to be announcing that we’ll be investing a record £1.148bn in policing this year from City Hall.
"This means we will be providing more than double the amount of funding for the police and crime prevention compared to when I first became Mayor.
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“The reality is the Government continues to chronically underfund policing in London so I’m having to step in and use all the levers at my disposal to provide the urgent additional funding needed.
“As well as more money for the police, I’m also announcing an additional £6.5m for London’s Violence Reduction Unit so we can take more action to help divert young Londoners away from gangs and crime.
"This is part of my approach of being both tough on crime and tough on the complex cause of crime as we work to build a safer London for everyone.”