Cressida Dick and Sadiq Khan are at war over her £500,000 payoff plus £160,000-a-year pension

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A row has broken out between Dame Cressida Dick and Sadiq Khan over the out-going Metropolitan Police Chief’s exit payoff, according to reports.

After her dramatic resignation on Thursday, Dame Cressida is in line for a payout of more than £500,000 on top of a £160,000-a-year gold-plated pension in what has been described as a ‘dreadful reward for failure’.

Under the terms of her two-year extended contract, signed in September, Dame Cressida, 61, can expect to receive her £246,109 annual salary with £3,074 benefits for the remaining 25 months she had left to serve until April 2024.

She will also receive a bumper pension payout because it is effectively the second time that she has ‘retired’ from the Metropolitan Police after clocking up nearly 37 years’ service.

According to The Times, both the Met and City Hall refused to comment on whether Dame Cressida would receive the full amount, but Mr Khan is said to be resisting handing over the huge severance package.

Furthermore, the newspaper reported that MPs and relatives of the victims affected by scandals Dame Cressida was involved in have called on Mr Khan to either refuse to offer her a pay off or fund the amount it himself.

News of her payoff came amid an already raging row about Khan’s shock move to force out the Scotland Yard commissioner. 

It emerged last night that her deputy Sir Stephen House is also likely to leave at the same time, leaving Britain’s biggest force rudderless – with vacancies in four of the most important jobs in policing.

National Crime Agency boss Dame Lynne Owens retired on the grounds of ill health last year, and Her Majesty’s chief inspector of constabulary Sir Tom Winsor is expected to announce his retirement shortly.

Dame Cressida said she had ‘no choice’ but to quit on Thursday night after a bust-up with Mr Khan, who withdrew his support after a series of scandals surrounding the misogynistic and racist conduct of her officers.

On top of her potential payoff and pension, she can look forward to possibly earning a small fortune from lucrative consultancy work, or even taking on a new high-profile public role. 

There is also a chance that she may join her predecessor Bernard Hogan-Howe in the House of Lords where she could qualify for a daily £323 attendance allowance.

Hogan-Howe left the Met in 2016 with a £9million gold-plated pension giving him an annual taxpayer-funded income of £181,500 a year.

Alternatively, she may now choose to put her feet up at her £1million village home which she shares with her partner Helen, who is a retired Metropolitan Police inspector. 

Home Secretary Priti Patel was said to be fuming that Mr Khan did not consult her before leaving a gaping ‘void’ for her to fill. They were still not speaking about the situation yesterday, it is understood.

Senior police figures also questioned the ‘fishy’ timing of the Labour Mayor’s decision amid claims of a ‘stitch-up’ over the Partygate scandal, in which the Prime Minister could be implicated.

Confirming the pension Dame Dick will receive, Metropolitan Police Federation chairman Ken Marsh said: ‘When she has left she will receive an annual pension that amounts to two-thirds of her final salary, so it’ll be around £160,000.’

A City Hall source said: ‘There will be a due process and details about remuneration will be agreed in due course.’ Yesterday Susan Hall, Tory chairman of the London Assembly’s police and crime committee, said: ‘Cressida has been treated appallingly by Sadiq. She has been thrown under a bus. Of course she is entitled to a payoff. She has been effectively dismissed by the Mayor.

‘It will leave a void at the top as opposed to a properly managed handover, which is no way to run Britain’s biggest police service.’

But former Tory MP Harvey Proctor, who was falsely accused during the Met’s botched VIP sex abuse investigation Operation Midland, argued she should be denied the cash: ‘This is a dreadful reward for failure. It’s appalling that the public purse should have to foot the bill to the tune of over £500,000.’

Yesterday sources said Dame Cressida was heartbroken by the loss of her dream job and could still refuse the payoff because she is ‘not motivated by money’.

A senior police source suggested the timing of her departure could be linked to Partygate.

He said: ‘The pre-emptive move discredits her and the force, which gives Labour an opportunity to question the findings when the Partygate report comes out and claim it is a whitewash if Boris isn’t forced to quit.’ A Whitehall source added: ‘There’s something fishy going on. We are trying to work out what happened between Sadiq and Cressida.

‘Earlier this week he’d been saying she had ‘days and weeks’ to come up with a reform plan, and then barely a day later he cans her. It’s all very odd.’

But, referring to a report on the conduct of officers at Charing Cross police station released this month, a City Hall source said: ‘It has nothing to do with the investigation into Downing Street. 

‘Sadiq was disgusted and angry that the Independent Office for Police Conduct report took him back to the dark days of policing in the 1970s and 1980s. Change had been promised. It hadn’t been delivered.’ 

Dame Cressida’s departure follows a barrage of criticism of the force including over its handling of the case of Sarah Everard who was murdered by a serving Met officer.

The force has also been criticised for being slow to investigate reports of parties in Downing Street and Whitehall in breach of Covid restrictions.

The final straw, however, was a report by the police watchdog which exposed violently racist, misogynist and homophobic messages exchanged by officers based at Charing Cross police station. 

Home Secretary Priti Patel has warned the new Met chief must be prepared to tackle the ‘policing culture’ which has left the country’s biggest force reeling from a series of scandals.

Ms Patel, who is beginning the search for a successor to Dame Cressida, said it would require ‘strong and decisive leadership’ to rebuild public confidence in the force’s ‘integrity and professionalism’. 

In a statement, said she would be looking for someone who could deliver results for the public.

‘Following a series of appalling incidents and too many historical cases involving serving Met Police officers, it is clear that strong and decisive new leadership will be required to restore public confidence in our largest police force,’ she said.

‘The public in London and across the entire country must once again have confidence in the integrity and professionalism of the police officers who serve them.

‘Policing culture and conduct have rightly come under scrutiny. Be in no doubt that a new leader must tackle these institutional issues.’

She added: ‘I will appoint a Commissioner who will deliver for the public whom our police serve and represent. Beating crime, preventing crime, protecting our citizens, our streets and communities at a time when this Government is investing record sums into the police, is paramount.

‘And above all that’s what I – and the public across the country – will want from the country’s most senior police officer: someone focused on the basics of reducing violence in the city, tackling the abuse of women and girls, ridding our streets of drugs, knives and weapons, saving lives and protecting the public from the those who wish to do them harm.’

Home Office sources said Ms Patel was angered by Mr Khan’s failure to inform her that he had called Dame Cressida to a meeting on Thursday afternoon which she considered ‘rude and unprofessional’.

Dame Cressida, however, chose not attend after reportedly being informed that Mr Khan had no confidence in her plans for reform.

Sources close to the mayor said that it had been a regular bilateral meeting and that it was up to Dame Cressida to inform Ms Patel of her decision herself.

Rank and file officers expressed dismay at Dame Cressida’s departure, with the chairman of the Metropolitan Police Federation, Ken Marsh, saying she had been treated unfairly.

Mr Marsh told the PA news agency: ‘She was much loved across the rank and file of the Metropolitan Police Service.

‘We feel the way she has been treated is wholly unfair and we did believe that she was the person who could take us through this and bring us out the other side.’

But former Conservative MP Harvey Proctor, whose house was raided by officers from the Met’s failed Operation Midland, launched in reaction to false allegations by jailed fantasist Carl Beech about a murderous VIP paedophile ring, said he was delighted by the news.

‘It is now time to clean the Augean stables so that a full inquiry can be conducted on all her personal mistakes,’ he said.

Harriet Wistrich, director of the Centre for Women’s Justice (CWJ) charity, said: ‘There were far too many stories of officers accused of violence and abuse still in their jobs, and of whistleblowers victimised instead of listened to.

‘Cressida Dick’s response to these series of stories has been wholly inadequate, and her description of Wayne Couzens as a ‘wrong un’ meaningless, next to the mounting evidence of multiple allegations of abuse and policing failures to tackle violence against women and racism.’