The chief constable of West Midlands Police is fighting to keep his job after a damning report revealed his force used "exaggerated and untrue" intelligence to justify banning supporters of an Israeli football club from attending a match in Birmingham.
Home Secretary Loses Confidence in Police Leadership
Craig Guildford, the West Midlands chief constable, is determined to remain in his post, the Guardian has learned. This defiance comes despite Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood publicly declaring she has lost confidence in him. This marks the first time in two decades a home secretary has made such a statement about a serving police leader.
The crisis stems from a report by Sir Andy Cooke, the chief inspector of constabulary, which criticised the force's handling of intelligence ahead of Maccabi Tel Aviv's Europa Conference League match at Aston Villa in November. The report found the threat from the Israeli fans was "greatly exaggerated", leaving a safety advisory group with little choice but to impose the ban.
A Catalogue of Intelligence Failures
The inspector's report uncovered a string of serious errors. Central to the police case was flawed intelligence about Maccabi fans' behaviour at a match in Amsterdam in 2024. UK police wrongly portrayed the fans as perpetrators of violence, despite having information to the contrary.
Testimony from Dutch police, revealed by the Guardian, critically undermined the West Midlands force's credibility. The Dutch disputed a raft of claims attributed to them, including the number of officers deployed and alleged links between fans and the Israel Defence Forces.
Mahmood told the Commons: "Claims... were all either exaggerated or simply untrue." In one stark example, the safety group was told Maccabi fans threw Muslims into a river. In reality, an Israeli fan was the victim thrown into the water, and British police had read Dutch reports stating this.
Guildford has apologised for one specific mistake: the inclusion in intelligence reports of a fictional match between Maccabi and West Ham. One officer described this error as an "AI hallucination".
Political Fallout and Calls for Resignation
While the Home Secretary has demanded Guildford's resignation, she lacks the direct power to remove him. That authority rests solely with Simon Foster, the West Midlands police and crime commissioner. Foster has praised Guildford's overall performance and said he will await further reports and a public hearing scheduled for 27 January before making a decision.
However, pressure is mounting from other quarters. The leader of Birmingham Council, the West Midlands Mayor Richard Parker, and the government's independent adviser on antisemitism, Lord Mann, have all said the chief constable should go.
Mayor Parker stated: "I do not believe the chief constable’s position is tenable." Ruth Jacobs, chair of the Birmingham and West Midlands Jewish Community, also said: "I think the majority of the community would feel that this is the right time to go."
The report concluded the failures resulted from "confirmation bias" and "carelessness" rather than deliberate distortion or antisemitism, and not from bowing to political pressure over the Gaza conflict.
West Midlands Police said in a statement: "We know that mistakes were made but reiterate the findings that none of this was done with an intent of deliberate distortion or discrimination." The force leadership believes its decisions ultimately kept the public safe.
