The UK terrorism reinsurer Pool Re held its annual Market Event in London. A focus was on the UK’s small and medium businesses (SMEs) and the need to drive adoption of terrorism risk management, to mitigate potential physical or financial impacts. The day heard a call to reinstate terrorism cover as a standard feature of commercial property insurance, to protect the livelihoods of SMEs and ensure business continuity.
Speakers included Home Office security minister Dan Jarvis; Jon Savell, Deputy Assistant Commissioner Specialist Operations at the Metropolitan Police; Neil Coyle, MP for Bermondsey and Old Southwark; and Air Marshall Edward Stringer CB CBE. They were joined on stage by Pool Re’s CEO Tom Clementi; Chief Underwriting Officer, Jonathan Gray and Angela Knight CBE, Chair of the Pool Re Board.
The event saw the launch of Pool Re’s paper: The Threat Posed to Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises. It explores the terrorism threat to SMEs and outlines the steps that businesses can take to manage terrorism-related risks.
Tom Clementi, Pool Re Chief Executive Officer, said: “When Pool Re was set up in 1993, our mandate from Government was to make terrorism cover accessible and affordable for all businesses in Britain. However, with estimates that only 5pc of SMEs are covered today, there is clearly some way to go. Thanks to our modernised reinsurance scheme introduced in April 2025, we are now in a position to offer our Members significant discounts to reinsure their SME portfolios where they can demonstrate they have reintegrated terrorism cover into their commercial property policies for SMEs as a matter of standard practice. If Members reintegrate cover at scale, which over time we are confident they will, the UK’s economic resilience to terrorism will have been significantly bolstered and the market will have been returned to the position it found itself in prior to the IRA’s mainland bombing campaign of the early 1990s.”
Dan Jarvis said: “In an era of increasing threats to our UK security, prosperity and values, it is more important than ever that we plan to meet these challenges. Pool Re is recognised around the world for its expertise and is as much a part of our counter-terrorism architecture as the security services and law enforcement. Knowing that Pool Re is there is profoundly reassuring.
“Small and medium-sized enterprises are the backbone of our economy, yet their lack of terrorism cover marks a vulnerability that threatens our national economic resilience. Pool Re’s efforts in tackling this gap remain utterly essential.”
Jarvis also recently gave a speech at the Cybersecurity Business Network’s inaugural Parliament and Cyber conference; see the Home Office website.
About Pool Re
Pool Re is the insurance industry’s mutual for reinsuring terrorism risk in Britain and an arm’s length body of HM Treasury. Visit https://www.poolre.co.uk/.
