Britain will end up with a fully armed police force in the coming years because too few officers will be willing to volunteer, a former Metropolitan Police marksman has suggested.
Tony Long, who was the last police officer acquitted of murder after shooting someone in the line of duty, said the numbers of those putting themselves forward for firearms training was plummeting.
The recruitment crisis in armed policing has worsened since Martyn Blake was charged with murdering Chris Kaba in south London in September 2022.
On Monday the 40-year-old officer was acquitted of murder following a three-week trial at the Old Bailey.
But Mr Long said the decision to charge him with the offence has had a huge impact on the confidence of his armed colleagues, who are all volunteers.
Speaking to the Daily T, Mr Long said: “There is a sort of a section of society that would disagree fundamentally with police having firearms at all.
“I’m not quite sure how they think the police would deal with terrorists or deal with armed criminals and drug dealers.
“I really don’t know, but there are people that think it’s against the British way of life for police officers to carry guns and therefore we shouldn’t.
“And perhaps that creeps into why some of these prosecutions take place, to a degree.
“I actually think if they are not very careful they are going to bring about the one thing that they really don’t want and that none of us probably want, which is a fully armed police force.”
Mr Long explained how under the current system, volunteers were subject to the most stringent selection process and training and were held to the very highest standard.
But he warned that if volunteers continued to dry up, the Met would have to cast the net more widely and standards would inevitably fall.
During the last application process just six officers put themselves forward for firearms training.
Officers are also leaving the armed units at an accelerated rate or opting for the potentially less dangerous Parliamentary and Diplomatic Protection rather than Armed Response teams.
Mr Long said: “If you’re only getting six volunteers a year instead of 250, if at the other end you’ve got people that are well trained, who are deciding to go to royalty protection or close protection, where life is safer and where they’re less likely to find themselves in Martyn Blake’s position or my position.”
He said if armed capability in the police fell below a certain threshold, the Government might have to call in the Army.
“They can’t cope with all of their current commitments. And while an 18-year-old soldier from a British Army regiment can quite happily stand outside the Palace of Westminster, who are you going to get to send after organised crime groups? The SAS? I don’t think so because they’re pretty busy themselves and they’re not going to want to get involved in that anyway.
“So what you’re going to have is a situation….where we’re just going to have to make it a condition of service.
“Every single officer joining the police has to pass a firearms course. How long do you think that firearms course is going to be? Mine was four days of shooting a gun and one day of tactics and that was in 1982.
“You’re probably talking about a similar period of time. You’re probably talking about five days of firearms training for every officer carrying a gun in the street.”
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