The Chipping Barnet MP has long campaigned for officers to continue to be based at Barnet police station in Barnet High Street, which closed its front desk in 2017

A lamp featuring the words 'Metropolitan Police' in white on blue glass — (Credit – Met Police)

Theresa Villiers has welcomed confirmation from a top police officer that plans to sell Barnet police station in Barnet High Street are “on hold”.

The Chipping Barnet MP told Barnet Post that she had received a letter from Metropolitan Police Assistant Commissioner Louisa Rolfe confirming that plans to sell the building, which closed its front desk in 2017, have been paused.

She had asked Met Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley to publish a review of the police service Estates Strategy that was due to come out last year. The Met’s response suggested that the review would now be published later this year but confirmed that there were no short term plans to sell the Barnet building.

Villiers said “It’s a relief to have formal confirmation that plans to sell Barnet police station are on hold. This comes on top of an earlier concession that if the building were to be vacated then an alternative local base would have to be found for police neighbourhood teams.”

“But my campaign will continue until the Mayor of London reverses his decision to close down and sell-off our local police station. Losing these facilities for officers will inevitably have a negative impact on police presence and visibility in the Chipping Barnet constituency. It would mean officers wasting time having to go back and forth from Colindale police station.”

“In every discussion I have had with Met Commissioner Mark Rowley, he has said he wants policing to be rooted in the community. If that is the case, it makes no sense to retreat to a single police station in another part of our borough. Thanks to the 20,000 additional police delivered by Government, the Met now has more uniformed officers than at any time in its history. It needs places to put them. Selling off Barnet police station is short-sighted and wrong and would harm efforts to combat crime.”

Last year, Mayor of London Sadiq Khan sparked a strong reaction from Villiers when he intervened to reverse plans to close Uxbridge police station in the run up to the Uxbridge by-election.

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