Rachel Reeves faced growing questions over accepting free Sabrina Carpenter tickets for a concert at the O2 Arena as No10 said it was down to her “judgement” and a Cabinet colleague said she would not accept such freebies.
The Chancellor has said she accepted free tickets to see Carpenter live because it was “the right thing to do from a security perspective”.
Ms Reeves said she and a family member went to a concert “a couple of weeks ago” with tickets that “weren’t tickets that you were able to buy”.
Asked about the row, the Prime Minister’s official spokesman said: “We updated on the ministerial code previously.
“The rules set out that each case is a matter of individual judgement for ministers.”
Pressed whether the Prime Minister believed Ms Reeves had made the right judgement, he added: “The Chancellor has spoken about this over the weekend, you have got her language, and the Prime Minister supports all of his ministers making their own judgements in relation to these matters.”
Earlier, asked on Times Radio if she felt the Chancellor’s decision was right, Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander said: "I haven't taken any tickets to be honest since I was elected back in June as a new Member of Parliament and going straight into the Ministry of Justice and then coming straight into the Department for Transport. I actually sadly haven't been to see any concerts at all over the last nine months, partly because I've been very very busy."
Pressed on whether she would have taken the tickets, she added: "I have never, as a Member of Parliament I have never accepted tickets to any concerts or anything like that."
Asked about the Espresso singer’s show on the BBC’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg programme, Ms Reeves pledged to declare the value of her tickets.
Her visit to London’s O2 Arena, first reported in the i newspaper earlier this month, followed a row over ministers accepting freebies and a change to the Ministerial Code with new guiding principles on when gifts and hospitality are acceptable.
Sir Keir Starmer last year received several gifts from prominent Labour donor Lord Alli, including “multiple pairs of glasses” to the value of £2,485, “work clothing” worth £16,200 and accommodation worth £20,437.28.
The Prime Minister later paid back more than £6,000 worth of gifts which he received after entering Number 10 last year, including four Taylor Swift tickets from record label Universal Music Group totalling £2,800, two from the Football Association at a cost of £598, and four to Doncaster races from Arena Racing Corporation at £1,939.
Ms Reeves said: “I went with a member of my family to see a concert a couple of weeks ago.
“I do now have security, which means it’s not as easy as it would have been in the past to just sit in a concert, although that would probably be a lot easier for everyone concerned.
“So, look, I took those tickets to go with a member of my family. I thought that was the right thing to do from a security perspective.”
The Chancellor later added: “These weren’t tickets that you could pay for, so there wasn’t a price for those tickets.
“Obviously, I’ll declare the value of them but they weren’t tickets that you were able to buy.”
Facing questions about clothing donations last year, Ms Reeves told the BBC that while she accepted the gifts in opposition, it was not something she “planned to do as a Government minister”.
The Ministerial Code allows ministers to accept tickets but they should “attend functions and events in a ministerial capacity, including those where hospitality may be offered”.
This is “primarily a matter of judgment for ministers who are personally responsible for deciding how to act and conduct themselves”.
Shadow business secretary Andrew Griffith defended himself for accepting tickets for him and his wife to attend the Bafta awards in February, worth £4,000, from NBCUniversal International.
“I think that’s quite different… it’s an awards show, if you like a celebration of an industry, creative industries, it’s one of our largest industries. It’s one of our biggest exporters,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Westminster Hour of the Bafta awards.
“And I was there and a lot of ministers and people from different parties were there as well but its by nature of sort of an awards thing, not Andrew charging off to see Taylor Swift or something and obviously that was all disclosed.”
Mr Griffith also accepted ski passes and guiding for two people in Davos, Switzerland, worth £973, according to the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards’ register of members’ financial interests.
He took part in the 69th annual British-Swiss Parliamentary ski week alongside other MPs, the document suggests, and accepted hospitality worth an additional £324.
“I paid all other costs,” he added in the declaration.
He told the BBC that “going and engaging with Swiss Parliamentarians, which by the way helps get a Swiss services financial deal, that’s going to create lots of jobs in our economy for a big part of the sector.
“I don’t think people want politicians who sit entirely in a Westminster bubble and never get outside of that.”
