Met Police spend "Astonishing amount of public money to protect BAA property"- Doocey

7.00.00pm BST (GMT +0100) Thu 6th Sep 2007

Commenting on figures released after a meeting of the Metropolitan Police Authority today, which revealed that the Metropolitan Police spent over £7million in policing the Climate Change Action camp at Heathrow this August, Dee Doocey, Lib Dem London Assembly Policing spokesperson and a member of the MPA, said:

"This is an astonishing amount of public money to spend protecting BAA property when they refuse to pay their fair share of policing costs in any case. The Met have spent an equivalent of £100,000 on each arrest made, providing nothing more than a property protection service for BAA.

"The MPS and the Mayor should demanding that BAA pay the vast majority of the costs of this exercise so Londoners do not have to.

"BAA purposefully whipped up a media storm ahead of the climate change camp, which any reasonable person knew and understood was going to be a peaceful protest.

"It's time BAA stops abusing its position."