First of all, Thank You to Steve McCormick (our director of service delivery) for providing the September blog while I was away on leave. You can read what Steve had to say at the end of this blog: I trust you found it/will find it useful to hear about the work Steve and his team have been doing in relation to licensing, customer services and the Approved Contractor Scheme (ACS).
I attended a number of meetings in October, mainly to talk about the proposed changes to the regime and how we can take account of the wide range of views from the industry and the many individuals that we currently license.
I travelled to Rugby to talk with a group from the Cash-and-Valuables-in-Transit Group organised by Skills for Security. The main topic for discussion was the proposed arrangements for the new regulatory regime. As with most such meetings, there was robust debate on what the future approach to regulation should be.
At the beginning of October the Security Industry Authority’s chairman, Baroness Ruth Henig, travelled with me to Edinburgh to meet with Kenny MacAskill, the Scottish Cabinet Secretary for Justice. We were able to discuss progress on the proposals for transition and how this would be handled in Scotland, and to update him on our work north of the border.
The Strategic Consultation Group met at the beginning of October. As I have mentioned before, this is a collaborative group of people working in – and with – the private security industry and helping to provide an oversight of developing plans for – and the progress towards – the delivery of the transition to a new regulatory regime.
Membership of this group includes those who supply, buy and rely on private security, including representatives of The Security Regulation Alliance, security buyers, the police and independent members covering all licensed sectors.
Stakeholder Conference in Sheffield
On 12 October we held a major Stakeholder Conference in Sheffield. The event was well received with a high attendance, and we were able to discuss some of the details of how we are changing the way we work. There was an opportunity to hear presentations on future CCTV regulation, Olympic security and organised crime.
I would like to thank those of you who participated in the event and for the engaging discussions throughout the day.
The first of the Autumn ACS Forums and Future of Regulation Roadshows was held in Bristol. The aim of the Roadshows was and is to try and allow more individuals and companies to come and talk to us about changes to regulation.
This time around, we didn’t visit Wales for the Future of Regulation Roadshows (something I hope to remedy early next year).
I personally attended the events in Bristol, East Kilbride and Northampton and colleagues attended those held in Chester, York, London and Belfast.
These events have allowed us to explain the latest proposals on the new regulatory regime and to gain valuable feedback from those attending.
We held the ACS Forums and Future of Regulation Roadshows on the same day, sharing the venues to reduce our costs. This appeared to work well. I hope those of you who attended found the sessions interesting, and we’re looking at rolling out further events in the future.
I hope that many of you signed up to attend these events, which concluded on 22 November in Belfast.
I appreciate, however, that it’s not always possible for individuals to get to our events. You can still see our proposals and what we are saying by viewing the website (www.sia.homeoffice.gov.uk/future) and by following us on Twitter and Facebook.
Engaging with stakeholders via social media
On that note, our second live Facebook Forum took place on 25 October and it was good to see so many of you taking part.
We will be hosting our next live Facebook Forum on 5 December, focusing on our proposals for the future of regulation. This will be a good opportunity for you to ask us questions and to find out more about how our proposals may affect you.
I also try to keep track of what’s being said on industry message boards and value these debates even if it’s not always possible to respond to every comment.
The 2012 Olympics are fast approaching and we are working with many interested parties to ensure the effective delivery of security during the Games.
In October, I attended an Olympic Security Industry Advisory Group meeting, a group aimed at providing a bridge between the Home Office Olympic team and the industry.
We also continue to work to ensure that current regulation is properly maintained, including a joint exercise with the police and the Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA).
The operation enabled us to bring some operators in Bristol back into compliance with the Private Security Industry Act 2001, but also gave a clear signal to those in Bristol associated with serious crime in pubs, clubs or the guarding industry that the Security Industry Authority is part of a team of law enforcement bodies active in disrupting major crime in the region.
Meetings with ACS companies around the country
November has encompassed meetings around the country with ACS companies and licensed individuals and celebrating significant anniversaries with two of our stakeholders.
At the end of October our minister, Lynne Featherstone, visited the Security Industry Authority’s offices for the first time. The minister was given a ‘whistle-stop’ tour of operations as she spoke with representatives from the Customer Service, Licensing, Intelligence, Compliance and Investigation and the ACS teams.
The minister then attended our Board’s Performance and Finance Committee meeting to discuss the Authority’s current performance as well as future plans for the new regulatory regime.
I also attended the Small Business Network meeting in London and the Door Supervisor Network meeting in Leeds. Again, we were able to discuss the latest position on the new regime, but there were also questions and much debate on preparations for the Olympics and the role of private security during the Games.
As part of our work to engage with those who buy private security, we held our third Buyers’ Meeting on 4 November. I would like to thank those who attended for the lively discussions, particularly in relation to business licensing and the value of the ACS hallmark.
The next meeting will be held in early 2012: any security buyers interested in attending should e-mail: stakeholder@sia.gsi.gov.uk
Attendance at Consec 2011
The beginning of November saw me at Consec 2011, the Annual Conference of the Association of Security Consultants. The agenda for the day was varied. However, a key theme for discussion was the economic and business downturn in relation to the private security industry.
Finally, I attended the National Security Inspectorate (NSI) event to celebrate its 40th Anniversary as well as the British Institute of Innkeeping’s (BII) 30th Anniversary event.
My congratulations to both organisations, and I look forward to working with them in the future.
- Steve McCormick writes…
Looking back, the month of September seems to have gone very quickly. I’ve spent much of my time working with my senior team to put more detail into the specifications for the new systems that we’ll need to support us in the future, as well as dealing with all the normal day-to-day business issues.
The development work is going well, and I’m hopeful that we’ll make significant progress towards changing the way we work with individuals and businesses well in advance of the introduction of any future regulatory regime.
Towards the end of August I was able to attend the annual Government ICT Conference held here in London. This year it focused on operational efficiency and the ‘green’ agenda, with existing suppliers to Government bringing forward new capabilities and services that could prove interesting to us in the coming period of change and the re-engineering of our systems and operating processes.
I’ve also been able to meet with a number of stakeholders, including speaking about our proposals for the future regime with accrediting body EDI and a number of training providers at the EDI-sponsored ‘Licence to Practise’ Group in Coventry.
I gave an update of how our proposals are progressing at the ACS Strategy and Standards Committee, and I’ve been meeting with security companies to talk about how we might work more closely with businesses when operating the future individual registration scheme.
While we work on developing the new regulatory regime we must still continue with our day-to-day business. Our licensing team dealt with a high level of demand during the peak of the holiday period and still managed to increase performance, completing just under 80% of all licence applications in three weeks or less.
Our customer service team has been working on proposals to change and simplify how we will contact individual licence holders in the future (for example, by using text messages and e-mail).
For its part, the ACS team continues to work closely with our compliance and investigation team to disrupt criminal activity in the private security industry, while at the same time developing proposals on possible business licensing criteria.