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Security for VIPs and the royal family is set to be scaled back in a review of protection arrangements amid increasing concerns over spiralling costs.
The move by Scotland Yard Commissioner Sir Paul Stephenson comes after an exposé of Tony Blair's security revealed that his protection unit claimed £250,000 a year in expenses on hotels and restaurants.
Asked about the cost of claims from the officers Sir Paul said: “I think it is time for us to look at the VIP protection arrangements and that is what we are doing with our partners.”
The review is being carried out with officials from the Home Office and the Cabinet Office.
Sir Paul added that they were examining the “who, why, where and when” of the security arrangements surrounding VIPs and royalty.
This year it was revealed that Scotland Yard had been forced to put an extra £4 million into protecting VIPs, including junior members of the royal family.
MPs heard how Sir Paul raised the issue with government “almost constantly” as he struggled to control the costs of protection.
Sir Paul was involved in a dispute with ministers in the previous Labour government over the estimated £50 million a year cost of protecting 22 members of the royal family.
He asked that the Home Office should pay the full amount rather than the £30 million it provides.
The cost of protecting some VIPS, and royals such as Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie, has come under increasing scrutiny as budgets are squeezed.
There have also been questions over protecting other VIPs, such as the reported £25,000-a-day cost of providing security to former Pakistan dictator Pervez Musharraf at his London flat.
Reader views (6)
with the cut backs i could just imagine the queen with a 44 magnum in her garter.....make my day philip take the last fish finger if you dare......give over lizzy practice on fergie...
- scony, middlesbrough, 14/07/2010 07:56
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Just watch Sir Paul back away again and find savings elsewhere in the service which will affect working people, meanwhie the 'parasite express' rushes towards it's own destruction.
They'll never learn until it is too late.
- Concerned Observer., Harrow, 13/07/2010 21:02
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Air miles Andy ought to be made seek gainful employment and employ private security officers to follow himself around golf courses and his two talentless daughters from pub to pub and from one exotic location to the next. Why should tax payers pay for security for these nonentities?
- R.F. York, Yorks, UK, 13/07/2010 18:58
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Hope that also includes Mr Tony Blair, the man who earns a fortune, yet the public still pays for his protection, etc, etc ....
- flo, London, UK, 13/07/2010 16:09
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For junior royalty read spoilt parasites like Fergies brats. Stop this waste now. We have police and detectives hanging around nightclubs at 4am, and Ascot enclosures. Ugh.
- armstrong, london, 13/07/2010 15:28
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It would be cheaper for the government to give everyone a gun; and tell them all to defend themselves; which the public have to do every day without any kind of protection or defensive weapons.
- mickinlondon, london, 13/07/2010 15:07
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