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The SIA is building a tool to tell you if Martyn's Law applies to you

14 September 2026

The Security Industry Authority published its monthly Martyn's Law update on GOV.UK on 11 September. It came from Laura Gibb, the SIA's Executive Director for Martyn's Law. There is no new duty in it and no new date. There are three things a hall committee or a licensee might want to note.

An online tool to check if you are in scope

The SIA says it is building an online tool to help you work out whether your premises or your event is in scope of Martyn's Law. It says the tool will be available to use in the new year.

Until then, the SIA points people to the flowcharts on ProtectUK as a way to explore whether you are likely to be in scope. Scope turns on how many people may reasonably be expected to be present at the same time, and that count includes your staff and volunteers, not just the public.

This matters for the venues that sit near the line. A hall that takes 180 for a wedding but 250 for a beer festival has a real question to answer, and so far the answer has come from reading guidance. A tool that asks you questions and gives you an answer is a different thing.

The SIA wants people who are unsure to test it

The update specifically welcomes premises and events who feel unsure about how Martyn's Law applies to them to volunteer as testers. The SIA also says it needs more volunteers to help build and test the notification system over the coming months, and that it will need more as commencement gets nearer.

That is an unusual invitation. The people the regulator says it wants are the ones who do not know where they stand. If your committee has spent a year arguing about whether the hall counts, volunteering puts your case in front of the people writing the test.

Free templates for both tiers

The SIA says it has been developing templates you can use to document your procedures and measures, and that it will publish these over the coming months. There will be one shaped for the standard tier and one for the enhanced tier.

The standard tier version is described as a way to help you prepare and think through the procedures you have in place or may be putting in place. The enhanced tier version includes the extra requirements that tier carries.

The practical point is simple. If someone is trying to sell you a document pack, the regulator intends to give you one. It is worth waiting to see it.

What the notification will look like

The SIA says the notifications portal will be reached through GOV.UK, so it should feel like other government services such as a passport application or a tax return. It says it is still working through the different needs of single small venues and of organisations running large portfolios.

The timings were set out in the SIA's August update and have not changed. For qualifying premises there will be a three month window from commencement of the relevant section to notify, with changes reported within 28 days after that. For qualifying events, in most cases the responsible person must notify within 14 days of the event date being made public. Someone else can submit the notification for you, but the legal responsibility stays with the responsible person.

Where things stand

The Act is still expected to come into force in spring 2027, and the SIA says it will confirm the exact date beforehand. Nothing is switched on yet. The SIA's own final section 12 guidance, which explains how it will regulate, is due in autumn 2026 along with a consultation report.

So there is nothing to file this month. If your venue is unsure about scope, though, the tool is coming and the SIA is asking for testers now. The Home Office section 27 guidance remains the starting point for anyone who already knows the law applies to them.

This is a summary of official updates, not legal advice about your premises.

Sources

This is general information about Martyn's Law, not legal advice, and nothing here changes what the statutory guidance says.

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