“Since I started as Met Commissioner last week, I’ve been reminded what a great, diverse city London is.

And I know my officers and police staff believe that it’s a good and honourable thing to come to work to catch burglars and robbers and rapists, and to disrupt terrorists and gangsters. I plan to harness their passion and energy to make London safer.

I’ve said I want total policing, with a total war on crime. By total, I mean that everyone in the Met - from the most specialist detective and forensic examiner to the neighbourhood officer and the cleaner who ensures the murder incident room is fit to use - contributes to a total, collective effort.

I’m going to ask a lot of questions. I’ll want to know why, if one or two boroughs have got a good crime fighting idea, the rest aren’t doing it. I want to know why some parts of the Met get a better rate of recovery of forensic evidence from burglary scenes than others. Inconsistent performance will be challenged.

A total war on crime means we will support all crime fighting ideas which are ethical, legal and done in good faith. I want to see my people pushing the boundaries, within the law, to disrupt criminals.

Let’s consider seizing, selling or crushing uninsured cars. The evidence suggests that 80 per cent of the people police take them from will be criminals.

Let’s enter the homes of suspected drugs dealers on a daily basis, rather than wait for expensive surveillance operations. It will be ethical because we’ll get court warrants. Experience shows you can find drugs, guns, knives and cash, because the criminals never know when you’re coming.

On certain days of a month, let’s mount a force-wide drive against a particular problem, be it burglary or failure to answer bail or using mobile phones behind the wheel. Not just in some areas; everywhere.

There are people in the Met who already do this kind of thing, and have got other, great ideas. If all this sounds aggressive, it shouldn’t. I want a professional and - a soft phrase, but an important one - a caring Met, which acts with integrity, humility and transparency. We’re totally committed to our excellent neighbourhood policing network. It’s where we really learn what the public want from us.

We have made some huge strides in terms of diversity over the years. But we are still not fully representative of society as we see it in London. We have to work on that.

We face real financial challenges and we will have to cut crime and cut costs. But I believe we can get a lot sharper using what we have - well-trained people, effective databases and proven crime-fighting technology - to target the criminals and protect the vast majority of good people.”