VIPs will demand Taylor Swift-levels of police protection, Cleverly claims
Shadow home secretary says Labour have set a precedent by giving the US singer a police escort during concerts in London earlier this year.
The shadow home secretary has said the decision to give Taylor Swift police protection during her concerts in London earlier this year will lead others to demand a similar level of security.
James Cleverly said the Government overruled the police and security services in their threat assessment in return for free tickets to the concerts at Wembley Stadium.
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer attended a sell-out Swift show for free and met the singer, after Government involvement in discussions over her security, which saw her given a taxpayer-funded police escort while performing in London.
Home Secretary Yvette Cooper and London Mayor Sadiq Khan, who were involved in the talks, also accepted free tickets.
The decision to give Ms Swift police protection came after Ms Swift pulled out of three concerts in Austria after police foiled a terror plot.
Speaking in the Commons during Home Office questions, Mr Cleverly said: “The operational independence of the police goes to the heart of the confidence in policing. As Foreign Secretary I saw where political interference in policing is rife and that is not a direction that the UK should travel in.
“Does the Home Secretary believe that it is right to overrule the threat assessment of police and the security services?
“Does she believe that some free concert tickets is the appropriate price for scrapping police independence? And after the appalling results from recent negotiations with the BMA, the RMT and Mauritius, has she considered recruiting Taylor Swift’s mum as a Government negotiator?”
Home Office minister Jess Phillips said: “Operational decisions for policing falls to the police, in this situation and in every other one.”
Ms Phillips went on to joke: “I would certainly welcome Taylor Swift’s mother to stand for the leader of the Conservative Party, and I think she would really offer something that is not currently available.”
She added: “The confidence of women in policing and being able to keep women in our country secure has dived under the previous government, so confidence definitely needs to be restored.”
Mr Cleverly, who was a Conservative Party leadership candidate who was eliminated from the contest earlier this month, said: “Having been Home Secretary I have on numerous occasions had to deal with a request from foreign VIPs for a level of protection that they demanded or requested but that we did not feel was appropriate.
“Does (she) recognise the difficult position that she has put her own Foreign Secretary into when those future requests come in and they have to be denied? When those individuals will pray in aid to the protection package put in place for a rockstar.”
Ms Phillips replied: “I suppose what I would wish to remind the honourable gentleman, and the house, is that concerts were cancelled in Vienna because of a terror threat that the CIA identified could harm tens of thousands of people.
“I sat in this very chamber last week, in front of Figen Murray, the mother of Martyn who was killed at an event in Manchester in this country.
“The idea that we shouldn’t take this security very seriously is I’m afraid something I simply don’t agree with.”
