Today, London Mayor Sadiq Khan announced more funding for the Metropolitan Police.

Sadiq Khan on Wednesday announced almost £50m of additional funding for the Met police as he set out final details of his annual City Hall budget.

The mayor said the financial support given by the Greater London Authority to the Met from April – much of it already announced last month – would be £151m higher than for the current year.

However the amount is not enough to provide all of the £76m sought by Met commissioner Sir Mark Rowley to fund his “New Met for London” plan to boost community policing and tackle racism and misogyny in light of the damning Baroness Casey report.

Lib Dem London Mayoral candidate Rob Blackie was unimpressed:

This is too little, too late. The Met Police has got into a complete mess under eight years of this Mayor and Londoners won’t be fooled by his latest pre-election giveaway.

The amount the Mayor has pledged still falls short of what’s needed and he should back the Lib Dem plan to divert further headroom in the budget to the Police.

Interviewed on LBC this morning Rob confirmed his top priority as mayor would be to fix the Met Police. He said:

Londoners are feeling let down by Sadiq Khan.

People tell me they are feeling worried – it might be a stabbing that’s happened nearby or a car that’s been broken into on their street. After eight years of Sadiq Khan as mayor the Met is in a mess.

As Liberal Democrat mayor it will be my top priority to fix the Met.

In further comments to LBC, he called the policy of stop and search for cannabis “a complete waste of time”, adding:

There are things that matter a lot more. Rape and sexual assaults are not getting the attention they deserve. If you call the police for shoplifting it takes the police two hours to arrive. They could be using their time better.