The spycop debacle is another nail in the Met’s coffin

In 2010, Mark Kennedy, a tattooed social justice warrior, was exposed as an undercover police officer. In this guise he infiltrated climate change activist groups and in the meantime formed a number of sexual relationships with fellow activists. Kennedy manipulated and deceived several women, including ‘Lisa’, with whom he formed a particularly close bond, while his wife and children were left in the dark about his exploits. But Kennedy was no lone bad apple. He was part of a group of Metropolitan Police spies deployed to gather intelligence on left-wing protest groups.

Deep Deception is the story of these spies, written by five of the eight women who, in 2011, began a legal case against the Met in order to expose systematic wrongdoing sanctioned by the most senior police chiefs in the land.

Helen Steel, the only one of the group to waive her anonymity, is well known for her role in courageously defending a libel action in the 1990s begun by McDonalds, following accusations by activists over low wages and cruelty to animals.