Metropolitan Police Assistant Commissioner Neil Basu will be responsible for leading the 2021 strategic command course (SCC), which prepares officers and staff for promotion to the most senior ranks.

AC Basu is head of specialist operations at the Met. He is currently the most senior serving BAME officer.

The college said AC Basu will be taking up the role to “ensure the content of the course meets the needs of the service”.

This includes a secondment to the College in the weeks before the start of the course and, from 20 September to 17 December 2021, he will lead the delivery of the SCC.

This year’s SCC course will follow the conclusion of the senior police national assessment centre (SPNAC), which has recently started and will run until the end of May.

Neil Basu said: “It is an honour to have been chosen to lead the 2021 SCC as director. Senior police leadership roles are without doubt some of the most challenging in the country. I passed the course in 2012 and I know that it has shaped my approach to senior police leadership ever since. I hope to be able to play my part in inspiring the next cohort of senior police leaders as they approach this major new stage in their careers.”

He added: “I know that I will also gain a lot personally from this role, and look forward to bringing that experience back into the Met.”

Bernie O’Reilly, interim College of Policing CEO said: “We are delighted Neil will be joining us to oversee the SCC, which is policing’s most senior leadership development programme. His extensive operational experience across a range of areas of policing and his varied career over four decades in the service means that he has all the qualities and skills needed to lead the SCC.”

The SCC will be run mostly with face-to-face at the college’s site in Ryton, but will also include online work.

AC Basu became a police officer in 1992, and has spent his whole career with the Met. Since March 2018, AC Basu has headed up specialist operations at the Met and is the National Police Chiefs’ Council lead for counter-terrorism policing.

In the 2016 Queen's Birthday Honours list, he was awarded the Queen's Police Medal (QPM) for distinguished service.