Critics claim trainers have been brought in at cost of more than £500,000 partly to ensure one of mayor's key pledges is met
The Metropolitan police has had to bring in external trainers at a cost of more than £500,000 to make sure it has enough officers to keep London secure during the Olympics and the Queen's jubilee celebrations.
The trainers, some of whom have only just left the Met and other forces on handsome pensions, have been hired to help get 1,300 new recruits up to speed in time for the two events, the Guardian has learned.
Critics claim the trainers would not have been needed had police numbers not fallen, and say they have been brought in hastily partly to ensure one of Boris Johnson's key pledges as London mayor is fulfilled in the runup to May's mayoral elections.
Police numbers are an important battleground in the race for the mayor's office. When Johnson entered city hall in 2008 he promised there would be an extra 1,000 police in place by this May.
In May 2008 the Met had about 31,000 fully warranted officers. By 2010 the number had risen to more than 33,000 but at the turn of this year the number had fallen back to just over 31,000.
In January it was announced that the Met would be given a one-off payment by the Home Office of £90m to make sure it had enough officers to police London during this spring and summer. The shadow home secretary, Yvette Cooper, described the payment as a "bung" to help get Johnson re-elected.
The Met did not have enough in-house trainers for the 1,300 recruits and so had to advertise externally. It initially hired 63 trainers, then swiftly reduced this number to 30 and had to pay some of those it found it did not need for the preparatory work they had done.
One police source with knowledge of the process said: "It feels wrong in the first place that this money is being spent on propping Boris Johnson up. Trainers were told they were there because of Boris Johnson. They've known for years that the Olympics and jubilee are coming up. Why the last-minute rush?"
The Met said the £90m from the Home Office was being used to make sure the force had "the right operational capacity to meet the ongoing challenging of policing London during spring and summer 2012".
A spokesman said: "Some external trainers, who have police experience in training large numbers, have been employed to assist in delivering the current level of recruit training. We remain on target to have around 32,300 officers by the end of March. There are currently 1,300 recruits in training."
The spokesman confirmed that the cost of the trainers – who are former police officers, although not necessarily former Met ones – was about £600,000. They would be employed until early June.
During a visit to a police training centre in Richmond last month the mayor said London needed high police numbers to "manage the many unique challenges we face in the capital".
He said: "With careful negotiation and budgeting we have managed to buck the national trend and continue to recruit more uniformed fully warranted police officers. By the end of my mayoralty we will have 32,320 full-time warranted police officers – significantly more than I inherited, which is great news for the ongoing fight against crime."
A spokesperson for the mayor said: "Thanks to sound management, considerable savings and the mayor's success in securing extra funds from central government, the Met is able to recruit, train and issue warrants to thousands of extra police officers at a time when most forces are shrinking. We remain confident there will be more police at the end of this mayoral term than there were at the beginning."
Johnson's rival for the mayoral office, Ken Livingstone, said: "If Boris Johnson hadn't cut police officers since 2010 there would be no need to spend taxpayers' money on private trainers. We need to cut out this kind of wasteful spending."