30 July 2025: HOLBA hosted a high-level roundtable and walkaround the Heart of London area with Mayor Sadiq Khan, Met Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley, Deputy Mayors Howard Dawber OBE and Kaya Comer-Schwartz, Westminster MP Rachel Blake, and Council Leader Cllr Adam Hug.

The visit provided an opportunity to hear directly from local police officers and businesses about safety and security challenges in the West End, and to explore ways to strengthen collaboration between the business community and statutory bodies.

The visit also included the announcement of funding for 80 more police officers in the West End, technology such as live facial recognition and for extra support to help with protests and other major incidents – freeing up local officers to focus more on day to day community issues.

As part of ongoing work by the Met and Mayor of London to boost local neighbourhood teams, the West End will see its policing team grow by over 50 per cent, meaning more officers on the ground to target prolific offenders, protect the public and deter criminals.

This work to focus resources in the right places, builds on enhanced partnership action with local authorities, businesses and communities to tackle crime in London’s busy town centres and high streets.

Ros Morgan, Chief Executive, Heart of London Business Alliance:

“A safer West End is essential to its success. We welcome the Mayor and Met Commissioner’s response to our calls for more policing. With over 200 million visitors a year and a £50 billion contribution to the UK economy, keeping this district secure isn’t optional — it’s vital. We’ll continue working with the Met to protect the West End’s reputation as a world-class destination.”

Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley said:

“The Met is getting smaller but more capable. We have a laser-like focus on ensuring our officers and staff are in roles where they can drive down crime on issues that matter the most to Londoners.

“This is what the public expects of the police, which is why we are putting neighbourhood policing first, tackling the crimes that we know are impacting the public in the busiest areas, and making the capital’s streets safer.

“We’re adding up to 170 additional officers, split between the West End and town centres across London. Thanks to the hard work of our local teams, neighbourhood crime has already fallen by almost a fifth over the last year and moving these officers to the frontline will make sure we are a more visible presence in London.

“While our budget has decreased in real terms, we are using this additional funding from City Hall and Home Office productively to support our mission to take a targeted approach to tackling volume crime and bolster our specialist tactics to disrupt the criminal gangs who fuel anti-social behaviour, robbery and theft.”

The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, said:

“Nothing is more important to me than keeping Londoners safe. Thanks to record funding from City Hall, the West End will see a 50 per cent increase in the number of police officers on the beat and an additional 90 police officers working in new or enhanced town centre teams in hotspot areas.

“Despite years of austerity by the previous government, this is the latest example of the Met Police and I prioritising what Londoners want and delivering on our pledge to put high visibility policing at the heart of fighting crime and rebuilding community confidence and trust.

“These new and boosted Safer Neighbourhood Teams will focus on tackling antisocial behaviour, phone robbery and shoplifting in key areas. This fresh targeted action is happening in tandem with enhanced police and partnership work already underway in our high streets and town centres this summer. We will continue to build on the crime reductions already achieved in the capital – with robbery, theft and knife crime down since the start of the financial year – to build a safer London for all.”

Already, the Met has recruited over 300 additional PCSOs for neighbourhood policing teams towards a target of 500, as well as adding over 300 officers from Superintendents to Constables.