Jacob Rees-Mogg has said it is ‘frankly embarrassing’ for the Prime Minister to have provided a police escort in exchange for free tickets and a meet-and-greet.
Speaking on GB News Jacob Rees-Mogg said: “Why does the Reverend Starmer behave like a lovesick teenager towards Taylor Swift?
“It is really extraordinary: He is the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. He holds one of the great offices, not just in this country, but globally. He is a serious, supposedly, international figure.
“And yet, for free tickets, he seems to be quite easily put in the pocket of promoters. He then gets – lucky, lucky Reverend Starmer – 10 minutes of her time.
“Do you remember the humiliation of poor old Gordon Brown, a rather distinguished figure in his way, when he was desperate to see Barack Obama and he managed to meet him in the kitchen of some swanky hotel for 10 minutes as a brush pass?
Well, at least Barack Obama was President of the United States; he was important, had a global role to play. He wasn’t some pop star.
“And in return for this precious 10 minutes, he provides police escorts. Not only that, but about half the cabinet seemed to have lobbied for these police escorts. The Home Secretary, the law officers, seem to have got involved, with the police not being entirely happy with the whole setup.
“And this seems to me, frankly embarrassing for a middle aged man to be behaving in this way. It’s beneath his dignity, and it’s certainly beneath the dignity of his office. And it then brushes up against the Ministerial Code.
“Now remember Reverend Starmer, Praise be, was going to make politics more honest. He was going to clean up the Augean stables that the Tories had left behind. He was going to be whiter than white, like Caesar’s wife. He was going to be above suspicion.
“The Ministerial Code says that even the appearance of influence in return for hospitality is wrong, and on this occasion, the appearance is extraordinarily clear. He got not just one set of free tickets, but two sets of free tickets, and then a nice little brush pass.
“And in return, Miss Swift got a police escort. Free tickets, and then you get an escort.
“But this surely is not what should happen, because it’s about your concept of the individual and the state.
“In this country, the only people who get escorts are either foreign visitors who need it for their security reasons or because of the state they represent, and the King and the Prime Minister.
“Very occasionally, it’s given to other ministers on urgent national business when they are doing something that is essential for the country.
“It’s not given just to the wealthy, because if it could be bought, if it could be sold to the grand and the rich, then all the rest of us are held up at their convenience on the King’s highway, and this is clearly improper.
“Every minute saved by Taylor Swift is thousands of minutes lost to the people who were held up whilst this was going on. But surely that’s not the sort of society we are?
“We are a democracy. We are a free society where the state doesn’t allow the rich just to trample on the rights of the many.
“But socialism always does, because socialism is always about the collective rather than the individual. They are important, and we, the little people, are not. And they don’t care if it wastes police time and resources. That’s not what matters.
“Bear in mind in Soviet times, they had ZIL lanes for officials to go ahead of the people of Moscow, and this is why it’s such an affront to the people who were delayed.
“It is selling off the freedom of the British people, but it’s also selling it so cheaply.
“Four tickets and 10 minutes? If you are going to be a bit dodgy, or at least to get something out of it. Dodgy, down market: that, I’m afraid, is the Reverend Starmer.”