THE Metropolitan Police has resorted to hiring cars to replace its own vehicles taken off the road due to safety fears. Routine monitoring of the £53 million maintenance contract outsourced to the Venson Group led to the precautionary recall of 1,000 response vehicles in a rolling programme due for completion at the end of April and a further 200 withdrawn for immediate repairs.

Engineers are understood to have been brought in from neighbouring police forces to help Venson's mechanics carry out the checks. New cars are also being brought into service with the Met earlier than planned. An investigation has been launched into car safety after officers complained about maintenance standards. The Police Federation told officers not to drive any vehicle they were concerned about.

To fill in the gaps in its non-covert fleet of almost 3,000 vehicles, the Met has hired 100 cars for 'general duties and surveillance work and to free vehicles that may be used in response mode already based at stations'. But the hire vehicles will not be used for emergency response duties.