It’s exactly one month until Labour conference and the party’s security shambles just got a whole lot worse. After the NEC voted to boycott G4S, the only firm willing to do the job were Showsec, a non-unionised security firm. This option was deemed unsatisfactory and so the party have had to go ‘cap in hand’ to G4S. Alas, the Telegraph reports that the firm rejected Labour’s offer over concerns about ‘staff safety’.
So, will the conference be cancelled? There is another option. The party could ask the police for extra security. However, this would cost them as where security workers for Showsec cost around £9 per hour, a PC comes to £59.65 an hour.
By way of assistance, Mr S has come up with a rough estimate of what the party should start put to aside for this. G4S claim that in previous years they have used a workforce of 100 to provide security for conference. Presuming 100 policeman were hired to work ten hours a day each over four days, this would cost the party £238,600.
Will Labour finally put its money where its mouth is? If so, it seems the millions raised from new member forking out £25 is about to come in very handy.
Update: Conference is on. With less than a month to go, Ian McNicol has announce that the OCS group will provide security.
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