Corbyn warns of police cuts 'gamble' after Paris attacks
Jeremy Corbyn warning over terror response after Paris attacks
(about 14 hours later)
Ministers will be "gambling with the safety of the British people" if they make cuts to police budgets, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn is to warn.
Jeremy Corbyn has warned that we "must not keep making the same mistakes" when responding to acts of terror.
"After Paris, there must be no cuts in the police front line," he will say in a speech to party members on Saturday.
In a speech to party members, he said Labour would support "every necessary measure" to protect people in the UK.
His comments come after senior police officers warned cuts could reduce the UK's ability to respond to an attack like that seen in Paris a week ago.
But it was "vital" during a time of tragedy "not to be drawn into responses that feed a cycle of violence and hate", the Labour leader said.
The Spending Review could include a police budget cut of more than 20%.
Meanwhile David Cameron is seeking to build support for air strikes against so-called Islamic State in Syria.
Chancellor George Osborne is set to announce the government's spending plans in Parliament on Wednesday.
There is no timetable for a Parliamentary vote.
Home Secretary Theresa May has yet to agree a deal for her department with the chancellor.
Senior police have sent Mrs May a private letter warning that a reduction in officer numbers will "severely impact" their ability to respond to terrorism.
'Disastrous wars'
Mr Corbyn's speech was postponed in the immediate aftermath of the Paris attacks in which 130 were killed by so-called Islamic State gunmen.
In it, he is expected to ask: "What's pro-British about ministers whose police cuts are so severe that, as senior officers have warned, they are expected to 'reduce very significantly' the ability to respond to a Paris-style attack?
"By pressing ahead with these cuts, the government is failing in its most basic duty: to protect our citizens. They must be halted."
He will also say that the UK's foreign policy in recent years, which has placed it "at the centre of a succession of disastrous wars that have brought devastation to large parts of the wider Middle East," has increased the risk to the country's security.
Mr Corbyn opposes UK forces joining allied air strikes against so-called Islamic State strongholds in Syria and is under pressure to allow his MPs a free vote on the issue.
He is also expected to touch on the economy, patriotism and the next general election in his speech at the Labour South West Regional Conference.
Election focus
He is expected to say: "The Tories won in May on their lowest ever share of the vote to deliver a parliamentary majority, just 37% of those who voted and less than a quarter of those eligible. That's no landslide in anyone's book.
"But Labour failed to win back the economic credibility lost in the financial crash of 2008 or convince potential supporters we offered a genuine alternative.
"If we focus everything on the interests, aspirations and needs of middle and lower income voters, if we demonstrate we've got a viable and credible alternative to the government's credit-fuelled, insecure, two-tier economy, I'm convinced we can build a coalition of electoral support that can beat the Tories in five years' time."
