The Uncomfortable Chasm

Martyn’s Law, as we’ve explored, is a monumental shift. It demands a level of proactive, intelligent, and immediate security intervention that a significant portion of the current training landscape, and indeed parts of the industry itself, are still struggling to deliver. Despite the SIA’s efforts to raise standards, deep-seated issues persist. The truth is, while the bodies are present, the competence often isn’t, and the industry has largely enabled this.

1. The “Cash-for-Licence” Scandal: A Dangerous Open Secret

The Problem: Let’s not mince words: there is a rampant, insidious problem of fraudulent training providers enabling individuals to obtain SIA licences without genuinely completing the mandatory courses or acquiring the necessary skills. Recent BBC undercover investigations laid bare a shocking reality: reporters were able to obtain compulsory six-day course certifications in as little as a day and a half, by paying extra fees, falsifying timesheets, and even being given answers to exam questions. This wasn’t a one-off; it was reported to be occurring eight years after a similar BBC exposé.

The Controversial Truth: This isn’t just about “cowboy” trainers; it points to a systemic vulnerability in the oversight and enforcement. The fact that this has persisted for over a decade, despite previous crackdowns, reveals a deeper reluctance within some corners of the industry to rigorously self-police. It means that tens of thousands of SIA-licensed individuals currently working in our public spaces may be fundamentally unqualified, posing a “genuine danger” to themselves and the public they are supposedly protecting. The industry has, in part, allowed this cancer to fester.

What’s Needed (But Often Fought): A relentless, coordinated assault on fraudulent training providers, with severe criminal penalties for those involved. This requires stronger collaboration between the SIA, Ofqual, and law enforcement, moving beyond licence suspensions to criminal prosecutions that truly deter. The industry itself needs to actively report and ostracise any firm, client, or individual suspected of exploiting these loopholes.

2. The Pay Problem: Why Excellence Remains a Luxury, Not a Standard – The Global Race to the Bottom and Its Fallout

The Problem: The “razor-thin profit margins” driven by a pervasive “lowest bid wins” procurement culture directly translate into abysmally low wages for frontline security operatives, not just in the UK, but across the globe. Whether deploying guards in high-volatile international zones or securing a retail park in a quiet town, companies, in their ruthless pursuit of winning contracts, often accept the lowest possible margin.

While much of the UK industry now meets or exceeds the £13 per hour mark, often slightly above the National Living Wage (currently £11.44 for those 21+)2025, there remain companies that brazenly fall below this standard. Moreover, for what a security operative is increasingly expected to do – from advanced vigilance in crowded spaces to de-escalating violent confrontations (over 2,000 incidents of violence and abuse against retail workers daily) – even £13 an hour, in many cases, is simply not enough. This is especially true for those facing high-risk environments or operating in major cities where living costs are significantly higher.

The Controversial Truth – The Self-Employed Scam: This economic disparity is amplified by a widespread and cynical tactic: the false classification of security operatives as “self-employed.” This isn’t a grey area; it’s a deliberate dodge. While genuinely self-employed individuals are not entitled to the National Minimum Wage, many security guards are effectively treated as employees – they don’t control their hours, choose their location, or work for multiple clients truly independently – yet are forced into “self-employed” contracts.

This allows unscrupulous companies to avoid paying National Insurance contributions, holiday pay, sick pay, pensions, and, most damningly, to pay rates below the legal minimum wage. This practice thrives on exploiting the vulnerable, including new arrivals to the UK, who often fear reporting for various reasons. It creates an unfair playing field, driving down wages across the entire sector for legitimate companies and their properly employed staff. This isn’t just unethical; it’s a systemic fraud on both the worker and the Exchequer.

The Controversial Truth – The SIA’s Action and The Fallout: The SIA has, to its credit, gone some way to address this by working with HMRC to clamp down on false self-employment. They are actively requiring security firms to ensure their operatives are correctly classified as employed for tax purposes, with deadlines as recent as August 2025 for compliance.

This is a crucial step towards ensuring basic worker rights and fair play for a significant portion of the workforce. However, this push for operatives to be “on the books” has created an unforeseen, arguably catastrophic, short-term consequence for the industry’s labour supply. Many experienced, highly capable operatives, who often worked under self-employed models valuing the flexibility (even if it came with lower pay and fewer rights), have simply left the industry rather than transition to formal employment.

This exodus has left significant gaps, particularly in the immediate wake of the new enforcement. Critically, the industry is now at a crossroads: these new voids, in my opinion, are being filled by the very “shirt fillers” Martyn’s Law aims to eradicate – individuals who, with a valid licence (perhaps fraudulently obtained), are available to cover shifts but lack the experience, commitment, and genuine skill that the departing operatives possessed.

The market for short-term contracts also remains a problematic grey area, still allowing some companies to avoid longer-term employment obligations. The industry risks well-intentioned policy inadvertently exacerbating the very problem of competency at the frontline, at least in the short to medium term.

What’s Needed (But Often Resisted by Clients & Some Employers): A fundamental re-evaluation of security’s worth. Martyn’s Law provides the legal imperative, but the Procurement Act 2023 must be leveraged to force fair pricing in contracts, enabling companies to pay a living wage that attracts and retains genuinely capable individuals.

This means clients must stop seeing security as a “cost to be cut” and start viewing it as a “critical investment in resilience.” Crucially, HMRC and the SIA must relentlessly pursue companies engaged in false self-employment, issuing severe penalties and revoking licences, ensuring that every worker receives the pay and rights they are legally owed. Simultaneously, the industry must develop urgent strategies to professionalise and attract new talent, ensuring the exodus of experienced operatives does not lead to a lasting decline in competence.

3. The “Tick-Box” Training Trap: Knowing the Book, Not the Street

The Problem: The SIA’s mandatory licence-linked training, even when delivered legitimately, is designed as a baseline. It covers fundamental knowledge but consistently falls short of preparing operatives for complex, dynamic, real-world scenarios, particularly in counter-terrorism. This leads to officers who can pass an exam but might freeze, misinterpret, or react inappropriately when faced with genuine threats.

The Controversial Truth: There is a pervasive attitude that once the SIA licence is obtained, the training journey is complete. Many companies avoid the costs and logistical complexities of further, site-specific, or advanced training. As the Manchester Arena Inquiry highlighted, “poorly paid staff undertook sparse training, in a cursory manner, often just online and with little application of learning.” This suggests a deliberate choice by some to merely fulfil the minimum legal requirement, not the moral imperative to ensure competence.

What’s Needed (And Has Been Inconsistent):

Mandatory, Audited, and Applied CPD: Beyond SIA top-up training, the industry needs truly mandatory Continuous Professional Development (CPD) that focuses on practical, scenario-based learning (e.g., advanced SCaN drills, de-escalation for specific high-risk environments, trauma first aid beyond basic EFAW).

Bridging the Knowledge-Action Gap: Training must move from theoretical knowledge to embedded skills through realistic simulations and regular exercises. The current approach is often “quantity over quality.”

4. Leadership’s Blind Spot: A Lack of Tactical and Strategic Acumen

The Problem: Beyond the frontline, there’s often a significant “security management gap” where management roles themselves are unregulated or lack consistent, advanced qualifications in protective security. This means strategic decisions about security, threat assessment, and deployment are sometimes made by individuals without the deep expertise required for modern counter-terrorism.

The Controversial Truth: For decades, security management has too often been seen as a progression for good guards, rather than a specialist discipline requiring strategic and tactical training in its own right. This can lead to a disconnect between corporate policy and effective frontline implementation, undermining the entire security chain.

What’s Needed (But Faces Internal Resistance): The industry needs to push for mandatory, higher-level qualifications for all security management roles, potentially through chartered status or advanced vocational training, ensuring that those designing and overseeing security strategies are genuinely expert.

5. The Grand Deception: Global Firms, Investors, Insurers – And The True Cost of “Saving a Buck”

The Problem: While governments enact laws like Martyn’s Law, the profound failings of the security industry are driven by a systemic, global problem: the relentless pursuit of profit by major corporations, often at the expense of genuine safety. This starts at the very top, with multinational corporations (from extractive industries to logistics giants) deploying security globally, including in high-volatile, complex environments.

These same global firms, in their contracting of security, are often complicit in the “race to the bottom.” They pressure security providers to accept contracts with the lowest possible margins, knowing full well this compromises adequate training, proper remuneration, and sufficient staffing.

The Controversial Truth – The Global Sham: The failings are rife in every part of the globe. Big global security firms, in their aggressive pursuit of contracts, often agree to terms that necessitate cutting corners on training and pay.

This isn’t just about local UK issues; it’s a worldwide phenomenon. They may present inflated or, arguably, falsified representations of their expected security levels and capabilities to their own investors, to their insurers for favourable premiums, and to their stakeholders, all to gain lucrative contracts and investments. The reality on the ground – of under-trained, under-paid operatives, often vulnerable to exploitation in high-risk zones – is deliberately obscured by the polished marketing and compliance checklists.

Instances: While concrete “smoking gun” evidence of explicit falsification is often protected by corporate confidentiality and legal agreements, the systemic outcomes are clear: UN and NGO reports frequently detail inadequate security provided by Private Military and Security Companies (PMSCs) in conflict zones, leading to human rights abuses or security breaches linked to poor training and oversight. Instances of mass contract termination in developing nations due to unfulfilled security promises or substandard personnel are common knowledge within diplomatic and aid circles. The pressure for any license or qualification, regardless of its true depth, is paramount for bidding, rather than true competence.

The Insurance Illusion: Insurance companies, theoretically the ultimate arbiters of risk, often fail to demand the granular detail or independent auditing of security standards they should. Their premiums are calculated, in part, on the premise of certain protective measures, yet the actual execution, the quality of the human element, is rarely probed deeply enough. This allows companies to tick boxes for insurance purposes while deploying “doorstops” – operatives who are present but not truly capable.

Investor Indifference: Investors, pouring billions into the security sector, are overwhelmingly focused on financial returns, often neglecting the crucial ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) factors that should scrutinise labour practices, training quality, and ethical conduct. Their silence, or rather their lack of demanding active oversight, fuels the very cost-cutting that undermines global security effectiveness.

The UK’s Role in a Global Problem: Even UK-based multinational corporations contracting security abroad are often part of this global dynamic, contributing to the downward pressure on standards, effectively offshoring the very problems Martyn’s Law seeks to address domestically.

What’s Needed (And Must Be Demanded From the Top Down):

SIA’s Expanded Mandate: The SIA must, in our opinion, start championing its own resolve and campaign for better pay and conditions for its members, actively lobbying government and industry for a living wage for all licensed operatives. It must move away from the perception, in many cases justified, of being just a “money-grabbing machine” focused on licence fees and course enhancements, with insufficient background work on the industry’s ethical and financial foundations. Its regulatory power must extend to demanding fair employment practices, not just minimum training standards.

Investor & Insurer Accountability: There must be a global push for investors and insurance companies to implement stringent, transparent, and independently audited criteria for security provision. This means demanding verifiable proof of adequate training, fair wages, ethical recruitment, and genuine operational capability, not just a checklist of basic systems.

Ethical Procurement: Clients, especially multinational corporations and governments, must shift their procurement models from “lowest cost” to “best value,” incorporating social responsibility, ethical labour practices, and demonstrable competence into their security contracts, globally. This is the only way to empower security companies to justly demand better rates, as they invest in the uplifted training and standard of the security operative, transforming them from a “mindless human” doorstop (unless specifically trained for that role) into a proactive, skilled professional demanding appropriate rates.

The Uncomfortable Conclusion: No More Hiding

Martyn’s Law is a reckoning. It forces the security industry to confront the uncomfortable truths it has, in parts, either ignored or enabled. The era of low pay, minimal training, fraudulent certifications, and the proliferation of “shirt fillers” is utterly unsustainable in the face of this new legislation and the enduring terrorist threat.

This isn’t just about new laws; it’s about a fundamental moral and professional imperative. The industry must meet these challenges head-on, or it will continue to betray the trust of the public it serves. The lives tragically lost were not just statistics; they were individuals whose safety was compromised by a system that failed to demand and deliver excellence. There is no turning back.