The new Security Industry Authority (SIA) chief executive, pictured, in his talk to our ST15 London conference in October, did offer the prospect of a cut in application fees. We featured that in our December 2015 print magazine; and we’ve just sat down with him in his offices on Holborn in central London for a first interview.
Exactly how much fees will go down, and when, he can’t say. The SIA isn’t allowed to squirrel away savings from one year to the next, and it has a three-year cycle of licence renewals; one year (going back to when it began badging in the mid-2000s) of a peak, the next year perhaps half that, and the third year in between. But it’s certainly the aspiration of the SIA to reduce fees in the next 12 months, once the new IT is running; and once the SIA knows the outcome of the official review.
It closes on February 18 and it does mean that licensing for private investigators (announced by Home Secretary Theresa May in 2013), business licenses for security firms in the SIA-badged sectors (once due to happen by 2015, then shelved during the Coalition) and any changes to the approved contractor scheme (ACS) are ‘watch this space’. Alan Clamp said that the review would happen before the Home Office made any decisions. Readers over the years may have wearied of answering consultations and – in private investigation for instance – may feel that the Government has said it’ll regulate; so what’s to review?! But the fact is that the review is happening and if you don’t have your say, you won’t have an influence. Alan Clamp said: “It is a great opportunity for everybody, whether it’s individuals or businesses or trade organisations, or whatever that has a view about the SIA to contribute. I would encourage everybody to contribute.”
For more about the review, visit the SIA website.
More from the interview with Alan Clamp in the March 2016 print issue of Professional Security magazine.
