We are committed to the Government's principles of good regulation. We aim to be:

Consistent

We work with regional enforcement partners such as the Police, and undertake joint operations as part of our compliance activity. This is mutually beneficial to the SIA and our enforcement partners as it minimises duplication of resources in the delivery of shared objectives.

As a deterrent to non-compliance with licensing, we also publish the outcomes of these joint operations for the benefit of all stakeholders.

We do not intend to regulate those parts of the private security industry where suitable alternative arrangements already exist. We have therefore published our Licensing Exemption Framework (download size: 79kb), which allows for a Government department or existing regulatory body to apply to the SIA to exempt certain persons from licensing.

We aim to ensure that stakeholders aren't required to duplicate effort in order to demonstrate competency for licensing. Where other suitable experience or qualifications can be evidenced, we accredit prior learning (APL) through our endorsed awarding bodies (section 3.3 of each sector's core competency specification contains details of the APL policy). We also have a Core Competency Exemption Policy (download size: 392kb), which identifies those qualifications that can be accepted in full or in part as meeting our competency for licensing requirements.