The Security Industry Authority (SIA) asks everyone who is involved in the private security industry, at whatever level, to contribute to a review of the SIA. You can complete an online survey, on the Home Office website. The deadline for responses is noon, Thursday, February 18.
Mark Rowe writes:
The survey throws everything about the dozen-year SIA regime up for grabs, asking if a private sector or ‘third sector’ body could do the job of the SIA. Besides asking how well the authority does, the survey asks if you agree with various aspects of private security being regulated, including the ones such as public space CCTV surveillance that already are; and whether the law behind the SIA, the Private Security Industry Act 2001 provides ‘appropriate powers’ to regulate the security industry. It asks if the SIA fees are too much or too little (!) and whether businesses and / or individuals should be licensed. While during the Coalition Government the SIA was due to bring in licenses for security companies, besides operatives, by spring 2015, it was postponed and then shelved by the Conservative-led Coalition. And the survey asks, in line with the Conservative Government’s business agenda, whether the ‘regulatory regime allows for innovative business practices in the regulated sectors’.
Meanwhile the SIA has brought out a 36-page document, its Annual Review 2014-15, titled ‘Improving standards and protecting the public‘. The first signed by the new chief executive Alan Clamp who took over from Bill Butler in the summer of 2014, it covers the SIA’s work and what’s coming next, such as work with buyers; and internal changes whereby if you are applying for or renewing a license, you’ll have to do it online, again in line with the general Government drive for providing services digitally rather than by paper or over the telephone. As Alan Clamp, pictured, told the ST15 conference at Heathrow in October, and as the document says, the SIA is looking to reduce the license application fee, and fees for companies in the approved contractor scheme (ACS) as the authority – in line with the Government’s aim to reduce the burden of regulation on business to a minimum – looks to trim costs, and pass on savings in reduced fees. You can download the document at – http://www.sia.homeoffice.gov.uk/Documents/reviews/sia-annual-review-2014-15.pdf.
The SIA is going through a review, as all non-departmental public bodies (NDPBs), like the SIA, are subject to periodically, known until recently as Triennial Reviews. For more on the review, visit the SIA website.
