Rick Prior
former head of the Metropolitan Police Federation

Rick Prior is a retired Metropolitan Police officer with 30 years’ service, including two decades in the elite Royalty & Specialist Protection Command. Elected chair of the Metropolitan Police Federation in 2024, he represented around 30,000 rank-and-file officers on operational policy, welfare and professional standards.

In October 2024, after a GB News interview highlighting officers’ growing reluctance to engage certain communities for fear of vexatious racism complaints, he was suspended by the Police Federation of England and Wales. Supported by the Free Speech Union, he won a landmark High Court victory in January 2026. The court ruled the suspension unlawful, procedurally unfair, irrational, disproportionate and a breach of his Article 10 ECHR rights, affirming elected representatives’ freedom to speak on public-interest issues such as race relations and policing confidence.

He has continued this advocacy through a Free Speech Union podcast on Critical Race Theory in the Met and by authoring the foreword to David Rose’s With Fear and Favour: Britain’s Policing Emergency. A committed free-speech campaigner, he remains active in supporting officers and contributing to debate on impartial policing

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