SIA licence-linked training relating to medical cannabis
Published 25 January 2024
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1. Request
Medical cannabis has been legal since 2018 in the UK, and now over 30,000 patients have prescriptions issued by private specialist doctors. The Department of Health and Social care has clarified that police can confirm the existence of prescriptions via the prescription label on the tub, a paper or digital prescription, and valid UK photo ID. Venues such as the O2 have official policies regarding allowing patients to enter venues with their medical cannabis, and I would like to know if the Security Industry Authority are yet to include this information in their training as part of gaining an SIA licence.
If not, I would like to ask if this is in the process of being included into training. Patients are currently experiencing issues with security staff at many different venues that are not aware that medical cannabis is legal, or how to identify a real prescription. Discriminating based on disability, such as discrimination of medicine, is protected via the Equalities Act 2010. Turning someone away from a venue, and discrimination of disabled venue-goers by security staff, is an increasingly prevalent issue as patient numbers grow.
I would finally like to ask how the SIA training could be updated to include this, such as a next step of action to get in contact with relevant decision makers.
2. Response
The SIA does hold this information.
The current SIA licence-linked qualifications include training on the law regarding drugs. The SIA would expect this training to reflect the most recent changes to the law. It is the responsibility of trainers to keep abreast of new legislative developments to ensure that any changes are covered in training.
The SIA is responsible for the knowledge and skills specifications, which are the high-level learning requirements for licence-linked security qualifications. These specifications are reviewed on a regular basis. The review involves a public consultation where new content for inclusion to the formal specifications may be put forward for consideration. However, this does not negate the responsibilities of individual trainers.
[Reference: FOI 0479]