Corporate report

SIA business plan: 2025 to 2026

Published 11 July 2025

Chief Executive’s foreword

We have an important role to play in regulating and raising standards within the private security industry across the UK. Those public protection responsibilities are at the core of everything we do as a regulator and employer.

This year is the final year of our 2023 to 2026 strategic plan. Our business plan supports both delivery of our core statutory duties and drives our plans for improvement and change. We will continue to prioritise ensuring the licensing regime means those who work in the private security industry are fit to do so and running and improving the business approvals scheme.

We will strengthen existing safeguards, to ensure that those who present a risk to the public cannot hold an SIA licence. We will make changes to ensure the criteria in Get Licensed is robust and reflects public expectations. We will launch a strategic review of the content of licence-linked qualifications to support licensed operatives. Through our compliance, inspection and enforcement work we will work to drive criminality and malpractice out of the industry including training malpractice and use our strategic partnerships to ensure that licensed security operatives can safeguard vulnerable members of the public.

The economic landscape is difficult for all, including those working in the private security industry. So, our drive for efficiency is more important than ever, ensuring we act on the recommendations in the recently published Public Body Review. We will continually challenge ourselves to be more efficient and effective. We will better use technology and innovation to do so and deliver ensuring value for money.

We will continue with two major change programmes: our digital and data programme of transformation to ensure our technology systems better support our licensing work and underpin our productivity and efficiency gains; and the next phase of development of a new business approval scheme with a clear focus on public protection and quality of service delivery for buyers, which in turn supports maintains their trust and confidence.

We welcome the new Martyn’s Law legislation which confirms the SIA as the new Martyn’s Law regulator. We welcome moving to the Security Minister’s portfolio for both existing and these new functions. With Martyn’s Law, the new remit will extend our oversight to premises as well as the security personnel working there. We will be shortly commencing a new programme of work to prepare for those responsibilities and expand our workforce to deliver on it. We will work in close collaboration with the Home Office in doing so, and report regularly to the Security Minister on progress.

None of this will be possible without the hard work and dedication of our own SIA staff. On behalf of myself, our Chair, Heather Baily, and all our Board, I would like to extend our gratitude to them, the private security industry we collaborate with and partners we rely on, so that working together we all play our part in protecting the public and making the UK a safer place to live and work.

Introduction

In the strategic plan 2023 to 2026, we set six strategic themes for change, to deliver alongside our statutory responsibilities.

These are:

1. Regulating effectively
2. Regulating efficiently
3. Improving individual standards
4. Improving business standards
5. Driving strategic partnerships
6. Supporting our people

Our business plan 2025 to 2026 sets out how we will deliver these in the final year of our strategic plan. Our business plan builds on achievements over the last two years, whilst responding to new opportunities and challenges, particularly the increasingly difficult financial context. This will be underpinned by our high performing culture, driven by embedding value for money principles across all our planning and decision making.

The SIA’s core role is to operate a robust licensing regime which ensures regulated security operatives across the UK who are sufficiently qualified and trained and adhere to high professional standards to keep the public safe. In February 2025, there were over 446,000 individual licence holders across the UK holding more than 500,000 licences.

We also maintain a (voluntary) register of approved providers of security services and inspect the activities of SIA licence holders and the approved contractors, taking enforcement action when needed.

The SIA teams work across the UK visiting both businesses that supply licensed security, and venues that deploy individual licence holders to ensure compliance with individual licensing and business standards are met.

Our plan sets out the depth and breadth of our work and:

• Our contribution to government policy objectives, including our anticipated role as Martyn’s Law regulator to make the UK safer from terrorism and our activities supporting the government’s mission to “take back our streets” and halve violence against women and girls in the next decade
• Our relentless focus on quality, impact, performance and efficiency throughout, ensuring accountability and compliance through stretching key performance indicators
• Ensuring our high performing, excellent workforce lives our inclusive culture and has the capacity, support and resources required to do their work
• Effective governance ensures continued strategic alignment, management of risks and adherence to robust financial and others controls over the use of money and other resources
• Leveraging our stakeholder partnerships and engagement, in Scotland and Northern Ireland governments, the private security businesses and industry bodies, partner agencies and other industry stakeholders across the UK

Finally, initial planning work for the SIA to be the Martyn’s Law regulator is well underway with the Home Office. The work will intensify further following Royal Assent of the Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Bill in Spring 2025. In the later section ‘Martyn’s Law – preparing for our regulatory function’, there is a summary of our initial priorities as we transition into becoming the Martyn’s Law regulator, appreciating this is subject to change as the Bill progresses through the final stages of the parliamentary process and planning work with the Home Office evolves over the year.

Deliverables and strategic outcomes

We set out below an overview, by strategic theme, of the deliverables and outcomes we expect to deliver through our business plan for 2025 to 2026.

Each theme is structured around:

• strategic outcomes that deliver the intended result and impact
• key deliverables that are our most important core deliverables
• deliverables: other corporate priorities we have identified that enable us to deliver on the strategic plan 2023 to 2026 commitments

Regulating effectively

“We will improve our effectiveness by focusing on improved public protection outcomes as we operate a robust, risk-based, licensing and compliance regime” – Strategic Plan 2023 to 2026.

Our first key deliverable is focussed on improving our approach to managing reports of non-compliance through a new internal information triage and assessment centre. This will streamline the existing process and strengthen the rigour and consistency of the way we assess, respond and escalate concerns about non-compliance and wider criminal behaviour that are raised by licence holders, security companies, government agencies and members of the public.

Our second key deliverable supports our responsible data culture. Data security and management is integral to our organisation’s success and rigour. We have a well-established infrastructure of security systems, processes and staff training. We will now invest time in improving the quality of our data collection and processing. We will lead a review to develop a new data strategy to underpin and complement these activities and the programme of digital transformation work.

Strategic outcomes

The outcomes we expect to achieve are:

• improved compliance and enforcement of the Private Security Industry Act: deterring, disrupting and sanctioning
• better management of the interface between regulatory regimes on public protection, the risks they pose and the means of mitigating those risks
• improved understanding of the private security industry: the individuals and businesses within it

Key deliverables

We will:

• launch the revised triage and assessment centre to ensure effective management of reported compliance concerns, from licence holders, security companies, government agencies and the public that put public safety at risk
• develop a new data strategy to embed better understanding, use and exploitation of data across the SIA, supporting our digital strategy and continuously improving our data culture

Deliverables

We will:

• ensure that licence holders understand and comply with the behaviour and standards expected of licence holders
• work with the Home Office to review our existing powers to ensure they provide the necessary tools to effectively carry out all our regulatory responsibilities
• introduce a new Harm Prevention Strategy that defines the actions we will take to help prevent violence and harm
• deliver a programme of visits to businesses to enhance assurance of the Approved Contractor Scheme and improve knowledge and understanding of different security settings
• enhance our insight of licence holders through surveys and the annual customer satisfaction survey
• increase direct engagement with businesses through our work with the special interest groups and through our stakeholder forum

Regulating efficiently

“We will provide value for money by spending well and being efficient in discharging our responsibilities and delivering our purpose” – Strategic Plan 2023 to 2026.

Over the last four years the number of active licence holders has increased by 21% from 365,226 in December 2020 to 442,796 in December 2024, alongside an increase from 50% to 60% of complex cases requiring manual intervention. The larger licence holder population has also resulted in more licences requiring review following information being disclosed about the licence holder, representing an increase of 125% within the same time frame. Despite this continued growth in application volumes, we have been able to maintain flat staffing levels through a programme of operational efficiencies, implementing technology improvements and developing smarter ways of working.

This focus on efficiency will increase throughout 2025 and 2026. We will embed an efficiency culture across the organisation. We have an effective efficiency strategy and plan in place that brings together our committed efficiency savings. This was endorsed in the recent public body review. We are on track to exceed the original 5% saving target on expenditure over the current three-year financial cycle (key performance indicator 2a) and are working towards meeting a challenging 7.5% target in our own plan and an even more stretching 10% by 2026.

We are in the final year of our three-year estates strategy and continue to work with the Government Property Agency to reduce our London office footprint. As a result of the annual budget planning process, we have improved the effectiveness of contract management and procurement. The team are now operating under the new Procurement Act, with the key aims to consolidate various existing process, and increase transparency in public spending. As part of these changes, we will maintain a comprehensive commercial pipeline, aiding contract and resource planning.

Our primary mechanism for realising further efficiency targets is through our digital and data transformation programme. This is an ambitious programme set to improve key systems to deliver a more effective and efficient digital service not just for licensing work but for our compliance work too. The outcomes of this programme will deliver improved data management, process and system improvements, delivering organisational efficiency and effectiveness as well as enabling our front-line staff to deliver better public safety benefits through their casework. This work is an essential part of enabling us to deliver our second key deliverable of improved digital tools for our field- based inspection teams.

Thirdly, under a refreshed licensing and customer service contact strategy, we will use associated new technology tools and explore the use of artificial intelligence (AI) to unlock capacity and help with team productivity as the licensing volumes continue to rise.

Strategic outcomes

The outcomes we expect to achieve are:

• sustainable, future-proofed technology and data systems underpinning the core licensing and compliance systems
• better management of the interface between regulatory regimes on public protection, the risks they pose and the means of mitigating those risks
• a budget position of no more than 3% variance demonstrating effective budget management and value for money
• achievement of required compliance against the government’s functional standards

Key deliverables

We will:

• ensure we continue to build and maintain robust, agile, and resilient technology services that enables us to carry out our core licensing functions, drive regulatory excellence and in turn support public safety objectives - this will provide all our SIA workforce with the right digital tools, systems and processes they need to work efficiently and effectively
• focus on our digital licensing processes and improve the applicant journey and reduce processing times. We will then concentrate on the system for our compliance work and design a new digital process for management of the Approved Contractor Scheme - this will increase organisational efficiency and ensure consistent compliance oversight
• improve technology and digital tools for our field-based inspection officers
• review and revise licensing and customer service contact strategy, and associated technology requirements to improve effectiveness and efficiency; including exploring use of AI for case prioritisation

Deliverables

We will:

• scope and prepare technical digital requirements for a new Business Approval Scheme, including design of a new statutory register for approved companies
• implement agreed recommendations of the Public Body Review
• deliver improvements to supplier relationship management approaches to ensure value for money from contracts
• implement final part of estates strategy Phase 2, reducing London footprint by up to 32%
• review the statutory licence fee in line with ‘Managing Public Money’ responsibilities, including preparatory work for a revised fees structure for the new business approval scheme
• implement ten outstanding actions related to functional standards on project delivery, human resources, finance and communication

Improving individual standards

“We will ensure entry training and behavioural standards keep pace with public expectations and support the private security industry in taking responsibility for improving training standards further” – Strategic Plan 2023 to 2026.

The entry level training and mandatory refresher training for licence holders is designed to give them the skills and knowledge to undertake their public security role effectively. In turn this means the security businesses and the public can have confidence that private security is able to keep them safe. It is essential that the training is updated to respond to the emerging risks and threats to public safety.

Our first key deliverable is to commence the next strategic review cycle of the licence-linked pre-application qualification content. We will work with the industry via expert working groups, key stakeholders and public consultations to ensure the qualifications remain fit for purpose.

We will also conclude and implement the results of the public consultation on the recent proposed changes to the licensing criteria - Get Licensed. This will ensure that the licensing criteria appropriately deals with criminality to ensure applicants are “fit and proper”, before a licence is issued.

Strategic outcomes

The outcomes we expect to achieve are:

• improved public trust and confidence in the private security industry
• better public protection by ensuring updates to entry training standards we require for individuals are updated

Key deliverables

We will:

• conclude and implement results of the public consultation on proposed changes to Get Licensed making the licensing criteria more robust on rules on criminality
• commence the strategic review of the content of licence linked qualifications, assessment, and quality assurance strategies

Improving business standards

“We will work with the industry to improve the standards security businesses work to and promote the value of good standards in security provision” – Strategic Plan 2023 to 2026.

The development of a new (voluntary) Business Approval Scheme (BAS) is in year two of design and delivery. Our aim is to ensure that the new scheme supports legitimate businesses and their economic growth, whilst deterring and preventing those companies who compromise public safety and professional standards. Responding to feedback from 2024 and incorporating the views of our stakeholders in the design of approval criteria and assessment methodology, we will complete phase 2, including a public consultation before confirming the final detailed design of the scheme.

The second key deliverable will be to develop a new buyers’ charter and establish a new SIA buyers special interest group to raise awareness of responsible buying of security and in turn raise standards of security.

Strategic outcomes

The outcomes we expect to achieve are:

• implement a new voluntary business standards scheme which will see a fundamental reset of the existing scheme
• develop and implement a programme of work to persuade buyers of the value and importance derived from excellent security provision to them and for public protection
• a greater proportion of the market is secured by those businesses that demonstrate the appropriate standards
• venues and other buyers recognise and prioritise supply by good quality security businesses in the SIA business approvals scheme
• successful prosecution of non-compliant businesses and financial penalties deployed
• increased consistency and standards of service delivered by private security businesses

Key deliverables

We will:

• complete phase two design of the Business Approval Scheme, including launch of second public consultation to inform the detailed design of the scheme
• establish a new Buyers Special Interest Group to improve knowledge and understanding of quality security and promote public protection outcomes and other standards in security purchasing

Deliverables

We will:

• commence design of new statutory register of approved companies
• in line with the current Approved Contract Scheme Buyers Strategy, run a campaign promoting use of existing Approved Contractor Scheme contractors in the private security industry with buyers, insurers and local authorities and targeted specialist sectors
• review and update web-based buyers’ materials, producing sector-specific materials and the publication of good practice case studies
• share publicly highlights of successful prosecution of non-compliant businesses.
• support businesses to increase the consistency of service they provide through engagement activities, with a specific focus on guidance for spotting a fraudulent licence and corruption including worker exploitation, low pay, tax evasion and organised crime
• increased consistency and standards of service delivered by private security businesses

Driving strategic partnerships

“We will use our influence as a respected regulator and work jointly with key partners to secure compliance, drive higher standards and improved public confidence in private security provision” – Strategic Plan 2023 to 2026.

Effective partnerships are critical to our success and effectiveness in discharging our regulatory responsibilities to public protection and making that wider contribution to government priorities including violence against women and girls, stopping serious and organised crime and protecting against the harm and impact of terrorism.

Our commitment to do more to stop training malpractice and related criminality drives our key deliverable work with Ofqual, Scottish Qualifications Authority and Council for the Curriculum, Examinations and Assessment (Northern Ireland) and with private sector Awarding Organisations and training centres. Through Operation Benchmark we continue our work to encourage timely reporting and through the lead partners reduce fraud and malpractice within the training sector that delivers this.

We will continue to engage with UK policing and partner agencies through Memorandums of Understanding (MOUs) to enhance and increase data sharing. Alongside this we will amplify the SIA’s contribution to the work of the UK intelligence community by increasing accessibility of SIA data via the Police National Database (PND).

Both key deliverables and our work with police forces ensure our statutory licensing decisions identify and revoke licences for licence holders whose behaviours and criminal conduct contravene licensing standards and prevent incorrect action on licence holders who are wrongly accused of having criminal records.

Strategic outcomes

The outcomes we expect to achieve are:

• improve integrity of the standards we set on training
• increased ability to proactively detect and effectively disrupt non-compliance and poor standards as better information feeds result in successful SIA compliance actions
• improved understanding and effectiveness of industry in achieving compliance with regulatory regime (and so greater public confidence and reduced public harm from non-compliance)
• influencing the public protection agendas where private security industry plays a critical role, achieving appropriate authority within our remit (crime, violence, women and girls’ safety, counterterrorism)

Key deliverables

We will:

• work with Ofqual, Scottish Qualifications Authority and the Northern Ireland Council for the Curriculum, Examinations and Assessment to combat training malpractice and host two events with awarding organisations to support their change of practice and engagement with the review process (Operation Benchmark)
• in conjunction with the Home Office and the National Police Chief’s Council, refresh the terms of the SIA’s use of the National Database, including governance arrangements and the upload of data

Deliverables

We will:

• conduct the 2025 strategic assessment of threats faced within/to the security industry and share the results of the assessment with enforcement partners to enhance the outcome of partnership working and identify areas of common interest
• engage and progress with partners, information sharing practices, including scoping of access to or better use of police systems, including the Law Enforcement Data Service (LEDS) pilot
• establish and maintain partnerships with police, local authority licensing and relevant regulators and partners on counterterrorism and serious and organised crime, seeking opportunities for intelligence led operational deployments
• detect poor standards and influence action on worker exploitation in the security industry by other lead bodies, such as, HMRC, GLAA and industry leaders, to tackle and deter worker abuse of SIA licence holders (Operation Empower)
• support public protection with two UK wide public safety related awareness campaigns on roles and actions of security, and link these to the summer events and festivals season and the autumn/winter festive season

Supporting our people

“We will support employees to give their best, perform at the highest level, continually improve their skills and fulfil their potential to ensure that we meet our public protection aims and deliver high quality services” – Strategic Plan 2023 to 2026.

Our people are our most important asset without whom we cannot achieve our goals. We are committed to ensuring our people operate in a supportive, inclusive, high performing environment. Central to that is our organisational culture enabling them to work to deliver their best and maximise their potential.

Our organisation is about to embark on a period of significant change and growth. As part of that preparation, we will be working with our staff and teams to revisit our SIA organisational values. They were first developed by staff, and it is right we do so again with them. This is our first key deliverable.

To support our new workforce strategy and plan, we will undertake a review of the workforce skills we need and design a plan to keep the skills we know we need and have fresh as well as develop essential new skills we will need going forward. This plan will focus on building capacity and competency throughout the organisation, with a particular focus on digital and change skills and preparing for Martyn’s Law changes.

Strategic outcomes

The outcomes we expect to achieve are:

• an improved recruitment and induction experience, so the SIA attracts the right talent to achieve its objectives
• improved, consistent performance management to drive increased personal responsibility for self-development
• a good leadership and line management cadre with the requisite knowledge and skills, supported by aspiring, motivated staff
• employees are and feel fairly rewarded for their knowledge, experience and performance
• an inclusive workforce, fully reflective of all our stakeholders, with improved employee satisfaction

Key deliverables

We will:

• develop a new SIA Workforce Skills Strategy and plan, to underpin the SIA’s Workforce Strategy
• review and reset SIA’s corporate values

Deliverables

We will:

• complete our Chorus Leadership Development Programme and support our leaders to embed their learning, and consistent standards of leadership practice and behaviours
• design and pilot a new aspiring manager and leader programme
• support a good leadership and line management cadre with the requisite knowledge and skills, supported by aspiring, motivated staff
• refresh articulation and promotion of our non-pay reward offering and approach.
• implement two key improvements identified in our 2024 staff survey
• EDI action: improve the rate at which colleagues declare basic equalities information (reporting on the key EDI strategic measure)
• EDI action: improve meaningful engagement with our staff through our new Employee Voice Forum

Core regulatory functions and services priorities

Our core role is to operate a robust licensing regime which ensures regulated security operatives across the UK have the right skills and knowledge to work in the industry and comply with high professional standards to keep the public safe. Through the diligent work of the Licensing and Service Delivery, Individual Standards and Business Standards teams, we can model what quality and excellence look like when keeping the public safe. Our Inspections and Enforcement team continue to design innovative solutions to deter criminality and enforce the security industry’s standards.

Licensing and Service Delivery

Licensing efficiency

Conduct 2025 review of fees charged for individual applications considering anticipated increase to third party charges for checks and efficiency-led technology changes.

Customer Service

Improve management of customer contact through new telephony provision and explore the use of new contact channels, such as chatbot and live chat services to support self- service and resolve queries earlier in the customer journey in the licence application process.

Criminality checks Scotland

Support Disclosure Scotland on their planned digital improvements to the criminal records checking process for licence applicants in Scotland. Manage the operational impact of Disclosure Scotland’s digitisation plans, which are expected to be implemented in 2025 for the standard criminality checks the SIA currently uses.

Business Standards

Improve business standards

Complete procurement and renewal of contracts for ACS certification bodies delivering current assessment services for the Approved Contractor Scheme to ensure continuation of statutory service.

Conduct 2025 review of fees charged for ACS.

Individual Standards

Annual customer satisfaction

Test and capture updated customer feedback and satisfaction on the licensing service to inform future decisions and improvements.

Training provider visits

Continue to work with awarding organisations to improve assurance systems that detect, disrupt, and manage down the risk of training malpractice within assessment centres providing licence-linked qualifications; through our annual programme of unannounced visits to training centres.

Inspections and Enforcement

Improving processes

Roll out revised Tactical Task and Coordination Group (TTCG) processes to better embed new intelligence led working practices.

Embed structural and process changes across all our inspections and enforcement functions resulting in greater efficiency, and operational improvements.

Upskill and maintain professional training for SIA inspectors.

Maintain professional training for SIA inspection investigators.

Public safety

Jointly with Communications, deliver and support two key public safety campaigns aligned to the SIA strategic priorities.

Corporate services, digital and data and governance

Our central organisational services are critical to the effective and compliant delivery of our statutory functions and change programmes. Those essential corporate functions include Human Resources (HR), Legal and Policy, Finance and Procurement, Programme and Projects, Corporate Information, Data Protection, Risk and Assurance, Strategy and Governance, Communications, Technology and Digital Transformation, and Estates and Facilities.

Corporate Services

Contract management and procurement

Implementation of new Contract and Procurement Act requirements affecting public bodies.

External communications strategy delivery

Deliver new plan to support agreed communications and stakeholder strategy to ensure we effectively engage key stakeholders, including the different voices in the private security industry, and we communicate the package of changes and robust measures the SIA is taking on public protection matters.

People and policies

Implement our People Strategy, including making changes to ensure a high-quality service and support, underpinned by up-to-date HR policies and practices.

Financial accounting

Upgrade accounting software in time to ensure the system is within technical support and facilitating delivery of core services.

Information security

Develop an SIA information management system (ISMS).

Corporate services

Drive continuous improvement to meet evolving demands while delivering effective and efficient support to the SIA. We will refine processes, strengthen capabilities, and enhance our impact.

Public prosecutions internal audit

Act on the recommendations from the 2024 Government Internal Audit Agency’s audit on prosecutions and investigation work.

Cyber security

To ensure continued accreditation with National Cyber Security Centre’s Cyber Essentials Plus scheme, undertaking annual audits of compliance and improvements.

Functional standards

Work with individual business areas to implement changes and improvements to achieve improved compliance and good practice with centrally set standards.

Improve quality and assurance

Introduce project implementation framework to improve management of projects, project assurance checks and reporting.

Strategy and Governance

Public bodies review

Track, monitor and report on implementation of the accepted recommendations in the Public Body Review to agreed timescales.

Digital and Data Transformation

Estates strategy

Continue the implementation of the three-year strategy by reduction of London office footprint.

Data security

Take a range of targeted activities to ensure high standards of a responsible and accountable data culture across the organisation.

Project delivery

Ensure consistent application of project methodology in our Programme work to ensure quality, timeliness and impact.

Business continuity processes

Conduct a review through external facilitation, implement the accepted recommendations and test preparedness.

IT service improvement

Implement changes to improve service to internal users and ensure they have the right digital tools to do their job, including embedding improved asset management.

Martyn’s Law – Preparing for our new regulatory functions

Last year, we were announced as the proposed new Martyn’s Law Regulator. Subject to Parliamentary scrutiny and Royal Assent of the Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Bill 2024, we look forward to taking on those new responsibilities in line with the timetable agreed by Parliament and the Home Office.

The regulator functions associated with Martyn’s Law complement our existing mandate and align and strengthen our role in public protection, extending our remit to premises and events, as well as regulated security personnel.

The Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Bill will place four responsibilities on the SIA:

1. Compliance – oversee premises and events that fall within scope of the legislation to ensure that they understand their requirements and they comply with the duties and requirements set out in the legislation through guidance, advice, and inspection.
2. Guidance – publish guidance on how we propose to exercise these functions and provide advice to qualifying places and events on how to comply with the legislation.
3. Sanctions – in instances where qualifying places and events commit persistent or egregious breaches of the requirements, use a toolkit of sanctions to address the issues, including warnings, fines, closure orders and possible criminal sanctions.
4. Reporting – monitor and keep under review the effectiveness of the requirements of the legislation. Separately reporting back to the Secretary of State on activities and progress through an annual report.

To ensure we are ready to carry out these new functions and support the premises subject to Martyn’s Law, we need to commence significant change programme. This involves the careful and considered design of the new function and staffing for it as well as planning for the mobilisation stage from 2025 to 2027. This will ensure the new regulatory function delivers on its public protection mandate and has public and other stakeholder confidence.

As we do so, we will protect and maintain the integrity of our existing duties and responsibilities. We will work with the Home Office to ensure both aspects of our regulatory functions operate seamlessly, so that there is clarity for those who are subject to our regulatory oversight, as well as stakeholders and the public, about how we operate.

We will receive new and separate investment from the Home Office to pay for staff and other resources to operate as the Martyn’s Law regulator. This includes funding for the two- year programme of work to carry out the mobilisation work. This period will provide the space and time to set up the structure, systems and processes needed to fulfil our regulatory role, ahead of those regulatory duties being switched on by Parliament in 2027.

Work has already begun. Towards the end of 2024, the Home Office commissioned external assistance to develop an organisation blueprint to help design the operating model and organisation structure required.

Alongside locking in the design, staffing and resourcing, our immediate key priorities include:

• new framework agreement, and funding envelope for the 2-year mobilisation period
• clear partnership arrangements with the four key statutory agencies to define and agree roles, responsibilities and remits
• support the Home Office to produce their section 27 statutory guidance on Martyn’s Law requirements for consultation
• develop the SIA’s own section 12 guidance on how the SIA will discharge its regulatory functions as the Martyn’s Law regulator, for consultation
• following completion of the organisational design blueprint, develop an implementation plan and commence recruitment of key staffing roles
• support the Home Office’s stakeholder engagement and communication strategy and plan

Key statistics

This list sets out the demand we are expecting on volumes for 2025-26, covering both operational and corporate activities.

• 7,000 licences revoked
• 80 criminal investigation cases completed
• 182,000 incoming paid licence applications
• 1,800 intelligence items generated from SIA investigators and assessed
• 12 Approved Contractor Scheme events held
• 110 new Approved Contractor Scheme applications processed
• 150,000 qualifications registered leading to 75,000 first time paid applications
• 170,000 service requests handled
• 240 Subject Access Requests completed
• 1,900 appeals against licensing decisions
• 58,000 calls handled
• 12,000-18,500 licence decisions made each month
• 770 complaints handled
• 4,600 items of information and intelligence assessed from members of the public, private security industry, partners and SIA staff
• 37 procurement campaigns completed
• 3,400 licence checks
• 70 recruitments
• 600 Approved Contractor Scheme annual returns and renewals processed
• 840 compliance and intervention cases opened
• 100 Freedom of Information requests completed
• 820 compliance and intervention cases closed
• 66% licence applications processed requiring manual intervention
• 600 venues inspected
• 76,000 initial right to work checks conducted at application stage
• 1,000 intelligence-led checks

Resources

We have developed this business plan based on assumptions about the availability and deployment of resources from our forecasted income. Our funding is generated from fees for licence applications and the voluntary Approved Contractor Scheme, except for a grant from the Home Office for capital expenditure.

The fees charged for a second type of licence held are less than for one due to being able to rely on the same identity and verification checks.

Funding

Budget 2025-2026	IA budget totals £,000s
Total income	33,956
Pay	23,658
Non-pay	(15,226)
Non-cash (depreciation)	1,322
Total expenditure	40,206
Surplus/deficit (including depreciation)	(6,250)
Licence rebate scheme	2,048
Adjusted surplus/deficit (including depreciation)	(4,202)

Income 2025-26

Based on licensing volumes up to December 2024, we have forecast that around 182,000 licence applications will be processed in 2025-26 generating £31.964m.

We expect ACS membership to remain steady and so have forecast to receive a further £1.992m in relation to the ACS scheme fees.

Licence rebate scheme

Based on the current rate of applications and on c.182,000 licences, we expect to fully utilise (by November/December 2025) the remaining £2.048m from the historical surplus rebate scheme

Expenditure 2025-26

As a result, we have set an expenditure budget for 2025-26 of £38.884m which includes £0.448m worth of efficiencies made in year. There is an additional £1.322m relating to depreciation charges in the year.

Outcome 2025-26

This is year 3 of the three-year cycle so is expected to generate lower volumes and be a deficit year, meaning the surpluses from the first two years should balance out the deficit in the third. We expect to generate a c.£2.4m surplus in 2024-25 (year 2) so that together with the surplus of £2.7m from 2023-24 (year 1) will lead to a c.£0.884m surplus position over the three-year cycle by 31 March 2026 – this is within c.2% of expenditure levels for 2025-26.

The statutory fee at 1 April 2025 remains set at £204 to meet the costs of the licensing processes. This is based on charging £184 to the applicant and using £20 per licence from the historical rebate scheme. A specific agreement under section 102 of the Finance (no 2) Act 1987 with the Treasury is in place which enables and facilitates this.

The assumptions underpinning our budget for 2025-26 include:

• Demand modelling is based on a three-year licensing cycle - this is year three of that cycle.
• We are adopting a new model from financial year 2025 to 2026 which tracks closer to the actual demand volumes being realised, namely the Bayesian Non-Linear model - an estimate of c.182,000 applications has been made.
• The licence fee of £204 continues to be part funded by accumulated historical surpluses, exceptionally agreed by HM Treasury to be retained and drawn down over a six-year period, concluding by March 2026 at the latest. Forecasting on current rates suggests this may conclude before then in November/ December 2025. This arrangement means applicants currently pay £184 at the point of application for a single licence.
• Salary costs are based on a maximum headcount position of 415, and prioritising resources to support core statutory functions of licensing, approvals and compliance.
• Vacant posts have been profiled to include appropriate planning and lead time which accounts for recruitment lead time, and staff turnover of around 10% during the year ahead.
• Home Office charged costs to the SIA for their policy and sponsorship services have been budgeted for as an increase from 2024 to 2025 budgeted costs but a 5% decrease from 2024-25 forecasted costs.
• A capital delegation of £4.281m has been allocated by the Home Office for 2025-26 against a SIA bid of £7.858m.

People

The headcount for 2025-26 is set out below.

Directorate	Posts
Licensing and Standards – comprises Business Standards, Individual Standards, Licensing and Service Delivery	166
Inspections and Enforcement – comprises Compliance and Inspections, Criminal Investigations, Operational Support, Intelligence	127
Corporate Services – comprises Communications, Finance and Procurement, Legal and Policy, Human Resources, Risk and Assurance, Data Protection	71
Digital and Data – comprises Corporate Information, Estates and Facilities, Programme and Projects, Technology and Digital Transformation	38
Chief Executive – comprises executive members of the Board (5) (figures exclude public appointments – the non-executive Board directors), Strategy and Governance (8)	13
Totals	415

Measuring performance against plan

The Chief Executive and executive directors together with the Chair and non-executive board members form the SIA Board.

Achievement of the plan and deliverables against the three-year strategic plan is the collective responsibility of the executive through the executive directors and their senior teams, the heads of functional areas. Progress of specific deliverables will be regularly monitored by the relevant heads of function and individual executive directors, with directors escalating risks and areas of concern to other directors and the Chief Executive as appropriate.

Material quarterly updates will be provided to the executive directors collectively and tracked at their formal meetings, chaired by the Chief Executive.

Performance against the plan will also be reported quarterly at full Board meetings. In addition, we will be held to account on this business plan and our performance by the Home Office, our sponsoring department, through regular engagement with the senior policy sponsor (director level), and quarterly meetings with the Home Office Sponsorship Unit. Our performance is reported to Parliament by the Security Minister, who is responsible for the SIA.

New Martyn’s Law governance has been set up. This includes a Strategic Oversight Committee chaired by the Chief Executive, with representative members from the Home Office, Non Executives and Executive. The committee oversees the strategic direction and delivery led by the SIA’s Martyn’s Law set up team. Additionally, a new SIA Programme Board is being established, chaired by the Programme Senior Responsible Officer, to oversee implementation and the management of key delivery risks.

We have established a set of key performance indicators to track progress against each strategic priority in the Strategic Plan 2023 to 2026 and monitor key performance in our core functional activity and service delivery. These enable us to track progress against our plan and help us make informed decisions where those plans may need to be updated or refreshed.

	Strategic theme	Key performance indicator	Regularity	Lead director(s)
1a	Regulating effectively	National compliance levels 95% or above [Listing new subsector compliance levels]	Monthly	Director of Inspections and Enforcement
1b	Regulating effectively	Increase risk-led inspection activity by 35% from 2025-2026 (to 3,400 checks), across the private security industry	Monthly	Director of Inspections and Enforcement
1c	Regulating effectively	Provide qualitative feedback to individuals or companies in 90% of intervention cases (unless being prosecuted, under criminal investigation or subject to subsequent compliance activity)	Monthly	Director of Inspections and Enforcement
1d	Regulating effectively	Ensure 90% of businesses or controlling minds, issued with formal warnings, improvement notices or prosecuted, are re-assessed as compliant	Monthly	Director of Inspections and Enforcement
2a	Regulating efficiently	Make savings of 5% or more against our planned expenditure across the 3-year cycle	Monthly	Chief Operating Officer
2b	Regulating efficiently	Make annual efficiencies over the 3-year cycle which are 3% above the savings targets at KPI 2(a) to offset the impact of the rebate scheme ending at the start of 2026-27.	Six monthly	Chief Operating Officer and Chief Digital and Data Officer
3	Improving individual standards	Reduce the average actions raised at unannounced visits to training providers to 4.0 in year 1, 3.5 in year 2 and 3.0 in year 3	Quarterly	Director of Inspections and Enforcement
4	Improving individual standards	90% of eligible businesses re-register or renew their ACS approval	Monthly	Director of Licensing and Standards
5	Improving individual standards	90% of the businesses on the annual list of top 65 UK security companies are ACS registered	Quarterly	Director of Licensing and Standards
6	Driving strategic partnerships	Increase year-on-year public protection joint activity and outcomes with key partners, to reduce harm across the private security industry	Quarterly	Director of Inspections and Enforcement
7	Supporting our people	Staff retention rates remain 85% or higher	Monthly	Chief Operating Officer
8a	Core activity	85% of all complex individual licence application decisions are made within 25 working days	Monthly	Director of Licensing and Standards
8b	Core activity	90% of all simple individual licence applications decisions are made within 5 working days	Monthly	Director of Licensing and Standards
9	Core activity	95% of decisions to suspend a licence are made within 3 working days from receipt of sufficient information to public protection outcome	Monthly	Director of Inspections and Enforcement; Director of Licensing and Standards
10	Core activity	Obtain a net promoter score of 50+ (“Excellent”) on our user satisfaction survey	Quarterly	Director of Licensing and Standards
11a	Supporting our people	An overall increase in results of EDI and organisation values questions in the staff survey, seeking above 70% responses and improvement to 2022 baseline results	Quarterly	Chief Operating Officer
11b	Supporting our people	Improve EDI demographic disclosure rates for EDI data in our HR system – seeking comparable benchmark with other organisations – with over 70% + completion rates	Quarterly	Chief Operating Officer

Our strategic plan sets out success measures for each strategic theme and where we want to be by 2026. Besides these key performance indicators, we will use departmental performance indicators to gauge progress, alongside further research on customer satisfaction, industry surveys and tracking usage of the guidance provided on GOV.UK.

Strategic risks

The consideration of risk is integral to our decision-making.

Our risk management processes follow the principles of HM Government’s Orange Book. They provide for the identification and management of risks in accordance with the Board’s Risk Appetite statement. We keep this under review to ensure that it remains appropriate to our areas of operation and the attainment of our objectives.

Our Audit, Risk and Assurance Committee (ARAC) provides oversight of our risk management processes on behalf of the Board with the support of our Risk and Assurance Team.

The discussion of risks is also central to our quarterly Board, Executive Directors and People Committee meetings together with all directorate and senior leadership meetings. Additionally, an overview of our relevant strategic risks is shared quarterly with the Home Office. In combination, these provide further scrutiny.

Due to the limits of our authority and remit, there are some risks that we are unable to control or mitigate in isolation. In these circumstances we work with our partners to manage these risks as effectively as possible.

We have clear processes for the escalation of risks within the organisation and to the Home Office where necessary.

The strategic risks include financial, delivery in licensing and investigation areas, major threats to industry and so confidence in the regime and to delivery of the major change programmes, as well as cyber and information and people risks. We are also vigilant to look for new and emerging risks that may threaten the attainment of our objectives. This includes those that arise in relation to our new regulatory role under the Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Act 2025 and without unduly disrupting delivery of SIA’s existing role, objectives and priorities.

In the coming year we will continue to develop our risk practices and to increase the integration of government functional standards within our activities.