Most of what licensees are reading about Martyn’s Law starts with the duties. The first question a landlord actually has is simpler. Am I even in? writes Shaun McManus.
The test in the Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Act 2025 is whether 200 or more people can reasonably be expected on the premises at the same time. Pubs qualify on use, because food and drink is on the Schedule 1 list. 200 to 799 is the standard tier, which is where nearly every pub that’s in will sit.
Two words catch people out. The first is “people”. The Home Office scope factsheet counts staff. The second is “premises”. The same factsheet uses a pub with a beer garden as its example of attached land that counts. So the number isn’t the bar on a Tuesday. It’s everyone, inside and out, staff included. And it isn’t the average night either. ProtectUK’s guidance says “from time to time” does not refer to an average attendance. If the garden fills every sunny bank holiday, or the big match packs the place three times a season, that’s a number you can reasonably expect, because it keeps happening.
Count it two ways
The fire sum gives you the ceiling. Fire risk assessments use the floor space factors from Approved Document B: 0.3 square metres a person for a bar area within two metres of the serving point, 0.5 for a bar without fixed seating, 1.0 for a dining room. A pub with a 60 square metre standing bar and a 40 square metre dining room comes out at 120 plus 40, so 160 inside at the absolute most. On that sum alone it’s out.
Then add the eight staff on a busy night and a garden that takes 60 in July, and it’s 228. In.
The clicker gives you the truth. On your next properly busy night, the kind you’d expect to repeat, put a cheap tally counter on the door, or do a head count at the peak hour and write it down with the date. Do the Christmas party nights, the beer festival weekend and the summer fun day too, if they come round every year. Keep the counts with your fire risk assessment. If anyone ever asks how you decided, that’s your answer.
If you’re in, the job is smaller than people think
The Home Office standard duty factsheet asks for two things. Notify the Security Industry Authority that you’re the responsible person. And have four procedures in place, so far as is reasonably practicable: evacuation, invacuation, lockdown and communication. Staff with a role need to know them. There’s no required training course and no required building work.
In a pub those four come down to plain questions. Which way do you send people if the threat is at the front door rather than a fire in the kitchen? Which room is away from the street and the glass? Who locks which door, and where do the keys live? How do you tell a full garden and a busy bar the same thing at the same moment? Write the answers on one page and you’ve done most of it.
The penalty for a standard tier premises is up to £10,000, plus up to £500 a day if a notice is ignored. The duties aren’t in force yet. Spring 2027 is the widely expected start, and the SIA’s final guidance is still to come.
One test worth doing tonight
After close, start a stopwatch and have whoever’s on lock every door that faces the public, without warning them first. Most pubs I’d bet find a door nobody has a key for, a bolt that’s been painted over, or a back gate everyone forgot. Two minutes, and it tells you more than any template. This is a licensee’s reading of the guidance, not legal advice.
About the writer
Shaun McManus is a licensee and personal licence holder in Washington, Tyne and Wear.
