The review also recommended that, in order to improve public confidence, every force should increase the number of visible bobbies on the beat.

In addition, the report’s authors also said there needed to be more effort made to improve ethnic diversity in the police, warning that at the current pace of change it would take another 58 years to achieve a police force that was representative of the population.

With detection rates having halved to just 9 per cent over the past seven years and public satisfaction with the police falling dramatically, the report recommended there needed to be major investment in frontline policing, training and technology.

Launching the review, Sir Michael Barber said: “There is a crisis of confidence in policing in this country which is corroding public trust. The reasons are deep rooted and complex – some cultural and others systemic.

“However taken together, unless there is urgent change, they will end up destroying the principle of policing by consent that has been at the heart of British policing for decades. 

“Policing in this country is at a crossroads and it cannot stand still whilst the world changes so quickly around it. Now is the moment to move forward quickly on the path of reform. The warning signs if we do nothing are flashing red and we ignore them at our peril.”