Ministers are facing questions over whether they intervened to grant Taylor Swift VIP police protection in order to stop her cancelling her London concerts.
James Cleverly, the shadow home secretary, wrote to his opposite number, Yvette Cooper, on Wednesday to ask whether she had personally made representations.
Swift performed at Wembley in August, days after she pulled out of three planned concerts in Vienna after police foiled a terror plot. The popstar and her entourage were provided with a police convoy by the Special Escort Group (SEG), a specialist unit of the Metropolitan police which is ordinarily reserved for the royal family and senior politicians.
Swift’s mother, who doubles as her manager, wanted a police escort from where the singer was staying to Wembley stadium, the Guardian understands, and threatened to cancel the London concerts if one was not provided. One source with knowledge of the row said: “The mum made a series of security demands given what had happened in Vienna.”
The Met initially declined, believing it was not necessary, leading to representations from the Home Office and Sadiq Khan, the mayor of London. According to the Sun, who first reported the story, Cooper stressed to the Met that the concerts’ cancellation would be economically damaging and embarrassing but the police did not budge.
One source said an operational risk assessment was carried out by the Met “not on what Taylor Swift wanted but on risk grounds, given recent developments” in Vienna, while another from those pressing the Met to act stressed there was no interference in the Met’s operational independence, but added: “They don’t listen to us at the best of times, why would they listen to us on this?”
In his letter, Cleverly asked Cooper whether any ministers spoke to the Met chief, Mark Rowley, about Swift’s police protection and whether they accepted tickets to her concerts before or after decisions were made about the security arrangements.
Khan is among several Labour politicians who accepted free tickets to Swift’s Eras Tour shows this year. It is understood that Khan’s tickets were offered before discussions about the security arrangements and were not provided by Swift.
Cooper also attended one of Swift’s Wembley concerts as the guest of her husband, the former Labour minister Ed Balls, who was offered free tickets by the chief executive of Universal Music.
Lisa Nandy, the culture secretary, insisted that the arrangements had been “an operational decision for the police” and not in the power of the home secretary or other ministers.
The mayor of London and the home secretary both have oversight of the Met. One source said there was “concern” that elements within the police had leaked “to embarrass the Labour government and mayor”.
A source close to the home secretary said: “The London Taylor Swift concerts in August came immediately after the cancellation of her Vienna concerts, after the discovery of a terror plot which the CIA’s deputy director said was designed to kill ‘tens of thousands’ of attenders.
“We can make categorically clear that all operational decisions were made by the Metropolitan police and they do not discuss security arrangements.”
A Met spokesperson said: “The Met is operationally independent. Our decision making is based on a thorough assessment of threat, risk and harm and the circumstances of each case. It is our longstanding position that we don’t comment on the specific details of protective security arrangements.”
Source: theguardian.com
