Local authorities, police forces and residents have begun the unenviable task of cleaning up London’s battered and burnt streets following a third night of rioting and looting across the capital.

During the most intense night of civil disobedience so far, residents and authorities in the boroughs of Brent, Camden, Croydon, Ealing, Enfield, Hackney, Haringey, Lambeth, Lewisham, Merton, Newham, Southwark and Tower Hamlets faced up to the stark reality of lawlessness on their streets – as an over-stretched Metropolitan Police force struggled to contain a contagion of youth violence.

Police officers are deployed during riots in Hackney, east London. Pic: AP Photo/Lefteris Pitarakis

The Met’s deputy assistant commissioner, Steven Kavanagh, said it was a ‘shocking and appalling morning for London to wake up to’.

The riots have also spread outside London for the first time, with major incidents reported in Birmingham, Bristol and Liverpool last night.

The trigger for the initial unrest was the fatal police shooting of a 29 year-old man in Tottenham last week, and while the rationale for youth violence and looting may now have changed – police and ministers have attacked the ‘copycat’ nature of localised violence - council sources have said that tensions remain high in many areas of the capital.

The violence witnessed on the streets of Hackney, east London, yesterday afternoon appeared to be triggered by an unsuccessful police ‘stop and search’.

Shops were looted, while buildings were set ablaze across the capital – and an increasing number of residents and police were attacked - in the worst scenes of rioting for over 25 years.

Three people are being questioned on suspicion of the attempted murder of a police officer following an incident in Wembley, north London.

London’s mayor, Boris Johnson, has also been criticised for what at this stage appears to be a slow response to the situation – although deputy mayor Kit Malthouse has been swift to seek responses.

The Met, meanwhile, is facing the most severe test of its policing numbers for decades. Over 1,700 extra police officers were deployed on the capital’s streets last night – but the Met nonetheless struggled to cope with incidents stretching to all points of London’s compass.