Careers: physical intervention training
There are careers in managed houses - and now there are careers just outside the door. Yes, the bouncer has become the door supervisor, a profession in its own right. You need a qualification now if you want to be legal and registered with the Security Industry Authority, or SIA, and doorstaff can even, for the first time, join a professional body - ConflictPro.
That basic qualification, the National Certificate for Door Supervisors, has recently been supplemented by training that aims to equip not only doorstaff but other pub employees to deal with potentially violent situations.
Conflict specialists Maybo and Wales-based Primus Training & Security both have physical intervention programmes available, and both are accredited by the BII Awarding Body.
There is a growing awareness that pub staff especially, though not exclusively, those working in high energy town centre venues that are usually managed houses are faced with physical threats during their working day.
The training helps staff both to protect themselves and to safely restrain and escort troublemakers from the premises using a range of non-violent options.
First Stop Security, an agency that provides door supervisors for clubs and bars in Hampshire and Dorset, has become the first to put its people through the Primus programme.
Chris Davies, a director of First Stop Security, believes the qualification is "essential to the development of the security industry as a whole".
"At present, door supervisors are not required by licensing authorities to be trained in physical intervention techniques. But, as it is something they often have to deal with, we have in the past offered them some limited in-house training to teach them how to break away from dangerous situations.
"The new course will provide them with some much-needed skills to restrain, remove and deal with physical situations in a safe way. We don't want to put them in a situation where our people have to rely on brute force and we want them to be properly trained."
The latest British Crime Survey from the Home Office reveals workers in England and Wales experienced 655,000 incidents of violence during the year 2004-05.
"Unfortunately more people now seem to be facing violence in the workplace," says Sean Colsey, director of Primus. "Many of these people have received no formal training in physical intervention, which means that if things do get physical, they run the risk of becoming a victim of assault or being accused of assault themselves.
"I have been teaching physical intervention skills as part of conflict management training courses for a number of years but until now nothing has been formally accredited."
Initially, 12 of First Stop Security's door supervision staff will receive the new physical intervention training with the remainder of the 60-strong department being trained over the next few months.
