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Rachel Reeves has been publicly criticised by a ministerial colleague for taking “freebie” tickets to a Sabrina Carpenter concert, 24 hours before the chancellor announces deep cuts to welfare and public spending.
Housing minister Matthew Pennycook was asked what he thought of Reeves’ decision to attend the concert in a VIP box earlier this month without paying for the tickets.
“I don’t personally think it’s appropriate,” Pennycook told LBC. “If I want to go to a concert at the O2, I’ll pay for it. But individual MPs, individual ministers, make their own decisions.”
The issue is damaging for Reeves because her Spring Statement, to be delivered on Wednesday, will contain cuts that will inflict pain on many ordinary voters and that are already causing disquiet among Labour MPs.
It is also embarrassing for the government after senior figures including Reeves and Sir Keir Starmer were dogged last summer by revelations over free clothing given by a Labour donor.
Reeves’ statement on Wednesday will confirm £5bn of welfare cuts and will be accompanied by an impact assessment explaining who might be affected. The cuts are the equivalent of taking £5,000 a year from 1mn people.
Reeves will also confirm at least £5bn of cuts from planned public spending, with some ministers warning about the impact they will have on public services at a cabinet meeting this month.
The chancellor’s strictures on the need for public spending restraint now comes against the backdrop of an awkward political debate about her own lifestyle.
She accepted VIP tickets to a Sabrina Carpenter concert at London’s O2 “to go with a member of my family”, Reeves said on Sunday, after ministerial disclosures publicly revealed the incident.
“I thought that was the right thing to do from a security perspective.”
Asked by the BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg why she had not paid for them, Reeves replied: “These weren’t tickets you could pay for, so there wasn’t a price for them.”
Heidi Alexander, transport secretary, has added to Reeves’ discomfort by declaring that she had not had time to go to concerts since last July’s election. “I’ve been very, very busy,” she told Times Radio on Monday.
Mike Wood, shadow Cabinet Office minister, said Pennycook’s comments were “an extraordinary slap down of the profligate champagne lifestyle Rachel Reeves has been enjoying since becoming chancellor”.
He added: “The chancellor must kick her addiction to freebies and focus on undoing the damage she’s doing to family finances in her emergency Budget tomorrow.”
Downing Street said Pennycook “was speaking on his own behalf”.
It added: “It’s obviously up to individual judgment of ministers and what the government has done is strengthen the ministerial code and strengthen the power of the independent adviser to ensure appropriate transparency.”
