THE Metropolitan Police Service has taken the final step in fully outsourcing its fleet operation by awarding an £11 million contract to equip all of the non-covert vehicles to S MacNeillie and Son. The Walsall-based company will annually fit about 700 police cars, vans and motorcycles with police radios, video equipment, sirens, light bars, tracking systems, dog kennels and prisoner retention cages.

MacNeillie will also apply police liveries to the vehicles, and at the end of a vehicle's police life, the company will strip and decommission it. MacNeillie has been working with the force since the early 1980s and managing director Keith Bradley says it is a landmark for the company to win the outsourcing contract to serve the Met's 3,500-strong non-covert fleet.

Receiver for the MPS, Philip Fletcher, said: 'Properly equipped and prepared police vehicles are crucial to our successful ability to deliver an effective policing service to the people of London. This announcement follows a lengthy and rigorous selection process. MacNeillie will deliver vehicles to a consistently high quality and achieve significant cost savings for the MPS.'