Licensees warned as stab proof vests recalled

Licensees are being warned their doorstaff might be wearing stab proof vests that fail to meet safety standards.

Wholesaler Thatchreed has recalled its Stabsafe vests after Leicester City Council's Trading Standards department declared them as unfit as pieces of personal protection equipment (PPE).

The vests were advertised as meeting KR1 standard, the "gold standard" in the UK used by the police and armed forces. They were tested at Cranfield laboratory and the fabric met the standard but the design of the flank did not.

Gavin Griffith, manager of Thatchreed and designer of the vest said: "The lower side plates overlap and they were saying that the knife could go in between them. We as a company have never had any problems with them or any back. To say it's unfit for use is unfair, to say it's a design fault is another thing."

He added: "There isn't a problem and it was more about how we tried to sell it. We were trying to sell it as something that in trading standard's opinion it wasn't. The KR1 standard is very high in this country."

Mark Thorpe, MD of security company Vision Security & Protection Services Ltd, which supplies Wetherspoons, Luminar and Inventive Leisure, said 50 of his staff had been wearing the vests.

He said: "If someone advertises them stab-proof vests, you're going to think it's the thing. We are deploying people with unsafe vests, obviously we are going to have to pay for new ones out of our own pocket - however it's better to be safe than sorry."

A spokesperson for Wetherspoons said: "We don't specify that door staff need to wear stab-proof vests and that's a decision for the security provider. If they are wearing them, they need to be of the required standard."