From the March 2010 print issue of Professional Security magazine.
I read with interest the article [December issue] written by Bill Fox regarding the introduction of breakaway and disengagement training within the door supervision (DS) sector, writes James Sanderson.
Using force is always going to be an emotive issue and I believe the planned introduction of breakaway and disengagement training is floored. Door supervisors need the tools to be able to move people in a controlled safe and ethical way looking after the welfare of both themselves and the person being moved at all times. What happens when the DS has used breakaway and disengagement and it has not worked? Conflict management won’t work. If we have already started on road of physical action the misconception that we can still somehow talk and make ourselves understood to someone who is emotional and is probably under the influence of drink and possibly drugs is misguided at best.
Door supervisors will resort to any tactic to get control of the client. This is highly dangerous as research has shown that grabbing people round the neck and getting people on the floor greatly increases the risk of death. In 1992 the Police Research Group (PRG) produced Paper 26 as a result of the increasing number of deaths in police custody. Its findings were stark. Restraining people on the floor greatly increased the risk of death and yet 17 years later we see police kneeling on suspects heads sitting on torsos, etc etc. This is not because they have to gain control, it’s down to a lack of training in the application of physical skills. The DS is going to be in exactly the same position as the police without the full range of restrictive holds at his or her disposal including the use of pain compliance. Contrary to popular belief using pain does not constitute torture it is a legitimate way of gaining control in difficult situations.
I deliver control and restraint training and use of force lectures and it astounds me how very few people within the security industry know what force they can use. The majority of answers stem from minimum force. I will challenge anyone to show me the word minimum in the Criminal Law Act 1967; Human Rights Act 1998; Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008; Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 or any of the Children Acts or the Education Act.
The article mentions hospitals and hospital workers having to get a manager to assess a situation if its thought a patient is suffering a mental illness. Firstly the hospital violence at work risk assessment should have highlighted a need for conflict management training for all customer-fronting roles and where necessary control and restraint training. Secondly why has there got to be someone to assess each situation? If anyone is causing or about to cause a breach of the peace ANYONE can use such force as is reasonable in the circumstances and because the violence at work risk assessment has been carried out and training given then intervention will be in a controlled way. Common law, the Criminal Law Act 1967 or the Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008 doesn’t say reasonable in the circumstances unless the person is suffering a disability and they are in a hospital A&E.
By interpreting law in such a complicated and dangerous way is contributory to the fact that a health worker is attacked every seven minutes in the UK.
The next problem is who is going to be charged with delivering the training. I phoned a London-based company recently as a prospective customer for a physical skills course. Frighteningly I was told that they taught basket holds, prone restraints and various other techniques which have be proved to increase the risk of death.
Door supervisors and indeed all security officers need to be control and restraint trained in the positive application of force and restrictive holds and pain compliance.
Under the Human Rights Act 1998 Article 2 we have a positive obligation to preserve life. The way these changes are being introduced undermines this because if door supervisors or security people on the whole can’t deal with violence in a controlled and proper way then companies and organisations will be staring down the barrel of a Corporate Manslaughter charge. The sentencing guidelines have been issued and any company found guilty will be facing a £500,000 MINIMUM fine. Companies will be ordered by the court to publish the fact they have been charged under Corporate Manslaughter legislation. If that isn’t enough, this loss of money is before the family bring compensation claims.
