Olympics (Security)

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Monday 16th July 2012 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

(Urgent Question): To ask the Home Secretary to make a statement on Olympic security.

[The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mrs Theresa May)]

Since I updated the House on Olympic security last week, there have been several allegations in the media, and I want to deal with each of them.

First, it was reported that Ministers knew there would be a shortfall in security staff last year. This is untrue. Last September, Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary reported, at my request, on the security preparations by the London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games, and it recommended several measures. HMIC reported again in February and concluded that LOCOG had plans in place to deliver the required number of security personnel. Neither HMIC report identified specific problems with G4S scheduling.

Secondly, it was reported that the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, my hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (James Brokenshire), who is the Minister for crime and security, had attended meetings in which he was told there was a security staff shortage. In fact, G4S repeatedly assured us that it would overshoot its targets. As I told the House on Thursday, G4S told the Government that it would be unable to meet its contractual obligations only last Wednesday, and we took immediate action.

Thirdly, it was reported that we must have known about the shortfall because the military was put on standby in April. This is also not the case. In fact, 7,500 troops have been part of the security plans since December, a further 1,000 were on standby in the event of flooding or other such civil emergencies, and we placed a further 2,000 on standby as a precaution in case the threat level increased. The 3,500 troops whose deployment I announced last Thursday are a direct response to the failure of G4S to meet its contractual obligations. A further contingency will remain.

The Government have strengthened the oversight of the security planning operation since we came into office. I will go through briefly what has happened since the bid for the games in 2005. From the beginning, the organisers planned to use private sector personnel for venue security. LOCOG confirmed that it would be using private sector security personnel well before the 2008 Beijing Olympics. It started the procurement process for security personnel in April 2010.

When we entered government in May 2010, we instigated a comprehensive review of Olympics safety and security planning, overseen by the then Security Minister, Baroness Neville-Jones. That audit and review identified a shortfall in LOCOG’s venue security budget, which we addressed in the comprehensive spending review.

We recognised that, with a project of this size and scale, even that additional funding might not ensure the level of security that we needed, so I asked for outside assurance of LOCOG’s venue security planning. In September 2011, I commissioned HMIC to carry out an inspection of LOCOG’s venue security plans. As I have said, that led to several recommendations that were acted on by the Home Office, the police and LOCOG.

LOCOG and the Home Office monitored delivery throughout the following months. G4S assured LOCOG and the Government continually that it would be able to deliver its contractual obligations. However, on Wednesday 11 July, following the difficulties with scheduling that the company has acknowledged, G4S notified LOCOG and the Government that it would not be able to provide the numbers of security personnel specified in its contract. I want to be clear that that was the first time that G4S admitted to any Minister that it would not be able to deliver the numbers of security personnel that it had promised.

We acted immediately to make further contingency arrangements by agreeing the deployment of 3,500 further troops. That brings the total military contribution to the games to 17,000, including personnel from all three services.

G4S has failed to deliver its contractual obligations, but we have the finest military personnel in the world—troops who are willing, ready and able to step in when their country calls—and we can be sure of their professionalism in helping to deliver a secure and safe Olympic games.

[Yvette Cooper]

Everyone wants the games to be an outstanding success. After the G4S shambles, we need things to be back on track and the Home Secretary needs to show that she is sorting it out.

First, will the Home Secretary tell us precisely how many people she now expects G4S to provide? It was contracted to provide 17,000, it now says that it will be 13,000, but it has admitted that the vast majority of those are still in process. Today, we learned that only a third of the expected G4S staff turned up to lock down a venue in Manchester and that the police had to do it instead. The monitoring has failed once spectacularly and the Home Secretary has failed to assess the numbers once before. Will she now tell us how many staff she believes G4S will provide?

Secondly, the Home Secretary told us on Thursday that 3,500 extra troops would be sufficient to fill the gap. If G4S fails to deliver the full 13,000 people it now promises, will those troops be enough? If more troops and police will be needed, she should say so now and not let this drift. The troops and the police will do an excellent job, but they need to be able to prepare.

Thirdly, the London Mayor said this morning:

“Everybody that was organising the Olympics knew this was coming up…ages ago.”

The deputy mayor said:

“This issue was flagged up repeatedly by both the Metropolitan Police Authority and subsequently the Mayor’s Office…for more than a year to G4S directly, the Olympic Security Board, and the Home Office.”

Even G4S says that it has been discussing the detailed shortfall for “eight or nine days”. And yet, last Monday, the Home Secretary told the House that she was

“confident that our partners will deliver”.—[Official Report, 9 July 2012; Vol. 548, c. 9.]

It is incomprehensible that the monitoring was that poor that no one told her until Wednesday. How on earth could the Minister responsible for delivering Olympics security be the only person who did not know? When was she first told that there was a problem with G4S?

We need to know why the Home Secretary has failed on this, because we need to have the confidence that she understands what went wrong and is competent to sort the problem out now, so that everyone can get on and make the Olympics a great success.

[Mrs May]

I will respond to the various points that the shadow Home Secretary has raised. She asked what the numbers look like. The revised solution of more than 23,000 personnel that was decided on at the end of last year was made up of 10,400 G4S guards, 7,500 military at peak, up to 3,000 Bridging the Gap, up to 3,000 volunteers and up to 2,000 incumbents that—

[Yvette Cooper]

What about G4S?

[Mrs May]

The very first figures that I gave were 10,400 G4S guards, 7,500 military, 3,000 Bridging the Gap, up to 3,000 volunteers and up to 2,000 incumbent security suppliers at existing venues. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for North Durham (Mr Jones) asks, “Bridging what gap?” Bridging the Gap is the name of a programme under which students and others can get employment.

The shadow Home Secretary says that we need to get a grip, but that is precisely what we have been doing. When we came to office, we made an immediate security audit, increased the budget and revised the plans. I have commissioned several reports on Olympic preparedness, each of which has led to a refinement of the plans. When G4S told us last Wednesday that it would be unable to deliver its contractual obligations, we decided to deploy extra military personnel to fill the gap.

The right hon. Lady asked why the situation was not known about earlier. I have explained that we commissioned reports on G4S’s preparedness, which contained recommendations on which LOCOG, the Home Office and the police acted, but those reports all made it clear that subject to acting on those recommendations, LOCOG was on track to deliver the necessary security personnel. Last Wednesday, G4S told us that it would be unable to deliver its obligations.

The shadow Home Secretary asked about timing. On Friday 6 July the managing director of G4S Global Events told Reuters:

“We are delivering a London Olympics now. If there was a similar event going on in Australia, I would be bullish that we could deliver that at the same time.”

I suggest that the right hon. Lady listens to the comments of some of her colleagues. Lord West has said:

“I don’t think it will affect the security of the games. That’s been taken care of. The Government have sorted that out, because the military are in there.”

The shadow Olympics spokesman has said:

“The important thing now is to focus on the solutions.”

I suggest that the shadow Home Secretary listens to her colleagues.