New Scotland Yard, it was proclaimed on Tuesday, is set to be sold off as part of a drastic £500 million belt tightening plan. The new headquarters of the Metropolitan Police is likely to be on a new smaller zone on the Embankment. New Scotland Yard is one of the most legendary landmarks of London.

The plan to sell the New Scotland Yard is a component of a wider belt tightening agenda, which involves chopping dozens of police stations and buildings across London, so that the force can save millions of pounds per year.

The force, which is starved of cash currently, is likely to benefit monetarily from the selling of the New Scotland Yard building, located in the heart of London. The sale of the building could give the force £150 million.

The building has been the residence of the Met since 1967 and is renowned for its rotating sign. Because of the crucial security tasks performed by the building employees, the building is engulfed by concrete blast barriers to shield it from a terrorist outrage.

The zone, to which the Metropolitan Police is planning to move its new headquarters, is the Curtis Green building on the Embankment. The Curtis Green building is the former headquarters of the Territorial Policing. This new headquarters is just yards away from the Ministry of Defence and Downing Street.

The police sources have remarked that the present 20-storey building in Victoria costs £11 million per year to operate and it requires £50 million in maintenance in the next few years.

The force’s senior command is headquartered in the current building along with the Yard’s most elite and clandestine squads, including the Counter Terrorist Command (CTC). Approximately 3000 employees operate in the present headquarters of the Metropolitan Police.

The new headquarters will be able to accommodate nearly 600 employees, an indication that it will be a smaller headquarters. The operational squads will be moved out.

Security analysts have asserted that the sale of New Scotland Yard demonstrates the dire measures that the Met needs to adopt to regain financial robustness.

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