Ministers urged to bring forward event security law

Figen Murray has called for a law requiring enhanced security at entertainment venues to be brought in ‘urgently’ before another terrorist attack.

Murray, the mother of Martyn Hett who died in the 2017 Manchester Arena attack, has campaigned for a government consultation on a new legal requirement for minimum standards of protection. Known as Martyn’s Law, the Protect Duty recently received vocal backing from the chair of the Manchester Arena public inquiry, Sir John Saunders, who said that serious violations should be punished with imprisonment.

A public consultation on the Protect Duty, which closes on 2 July, is seeking views on the scope of the law, but the government has not set a timetable for its enforcement.

Murray told The Independent that the government should take the judge’s remarks that ‘doing nothing is not an option’ seriously and ‘speed things up’.

Murray said: “Terrorists have not used the pandemic to bake banana bread and do jigsaws, they have spent it planning and recruiting, and we can’t be complacent. “The threat level is high and people are going out to socialise more.

We can’t rely on police, counter-terrorism and the government to sort all the terrorists out, it’s not possible, so measures have to be taken to keep people safe.”