NSI's Contract Quality Marque: industry reaction

04 Nov 09

With the National Security Inspectorate having launched its CQM, there were plenty of questions and observations from the floor at The RAF Club in Piccadilly. Brian Sims gauges the industry’s reaction.

By Brian Sims

For the most part, the security sector and (demonstrably) its client base have suggested by deed and word of mouth that they don't like change.

Like it or not, we still harbour a situation wherein some guarding company chiefs have no problem at all with their officers working well in excess of the 48-hour week.

On the client side, more and more companies are placing buying powers in the hands of those (ie FMs and procurement managers) who know little of security as a discipline and merely view the exchange as one based in finance rather than the welfare of people.

Again, like it or not change MUST happen. If it doesn’t, and soon, then we must all fear the worst. The present situation – even in a post-regulation and post-Approved Contractor Scheme (ACS) world – is simply not sustainable.

Can the CQM make a difference?

The question on everyone’s lips both yesterday and this morning is: can the NSI’s CQM make a genuine difference to a UK guarding landscape wherein, for many, the ACS has not (and no, I’m not about to compare the two schemes because they are very different animals)?

Longer term, the proof of the pudding will be in the eating. In the here and now, many questions are already being posited. One such came from CIS Security’s managing director Carl Palmer, who asked the NSI why the CQM hadn’t been configured for companies rather than individual contracts?

In answering, Dai Prichard harked back to the Contract of Substance and the original Towards The Future document, suggesting that there was much resistance to both on the basis that there would have been too much expense involved right through any participating organisation.

“Let’s try it this way and see if it works,” said Prichard.

Not wishing to back down, Palmer retorted: “What happens if only one or two contracts within a given company’s portfolio are operational under the CQM? The rest of your employees will be on different pay structures with different Terms and Conditions.”

A fair question, but one has to say that all officers ought to be regarded as equals no matter what contract they’re on. Naturally, that comes back to the client paying the right money for the service.

To my mind, if security is being ‘done right’ then the CQM could and probably should be in place on EVERY contract. We’re talking about the basics here. Basic Terms and Conditions that all officers should have been enjoying years and years ago. Why have they been a pipe dream for so long?

The CQM: laudable and welcome

The CQM is a laudable standard. A welcome standard, boldly launched amid continuing economic and political instability.

It’s a standard born of altruistic intent. As Andrew White stated, it’s not the result of the NSI team sitting down and seeing what they could come up with next. Rather, it’s very much a Marque and initiative devised in response to industry needs and industry requests.

VSG’s chairman Bill Muskin wanted to know more detail on the rationale behind the NSI subcontracting The Security Watchdog to take care of the site inspections for the Marque.

Andrew White quickly responded: “As an organisation, we do not carry out unannounced inspections out of hours. The Watchdog does. It may be The Watchdog that carries out the checks, but make no mistake that the Contract Quality Marque is an NSI initiative.”

Chatting to me after the official Q&A had finished, White ventured that the CQM had been ‘pilot’ tested (please excuse my RAF-related pun, but it seemed appropriate given the backdrop) by no less than ten organisations. The end result? No changes to the proposed document. I think that pretty much speaks for itself, don’t you?

Respect for those who are ‘The Industry’

We discussed the whole ethic behind giving security officers the respect they’re due with proper Terms and Conditions of employment. I’ve said this before and, without wishing to sound like a broken record, I’ll say it again…

Security officers should be salaried individuals. What are we doing paying the defenders of this nation ‘buttons’ (and on a Dickensian hourly rate basis at that?) It’s ridiculous. The only way we will have buy-in from those without whom there would be no industry is to make them feel proud.

Give the officers a salary. Afford them proper benefits. Luncheon vouchers, proper sick pay, etc. Then they might just feel wanted and they might even want to make a career out of security. It’s not rocket science, is it, so why can’t we just do it?

The CQM is saying all the right things, but client buy-in is going to be pivotal to its success (a fact Bob Doyle from Skills for Security later reiterated). That buy-in is what we’ve demanded for so long and over so many hours.

I for one sympathise wholeheartedly with the good contractors who do everything by the book and are then forced to confront some procurement type who just wants to look at the numbers. It must be soul-destroying.

That type of client has to be jettisoned. They’re never going to change. Well, maybe they might, but only if the insurance sector finally develops the backbone to refuse cover outright on those sites where, for example, the ACS and/or the CQM is not in operation.

Stipulate, don’t recommend

The last time I looked, there was a Memorandum of Understanding between the SIA and the ABI wherein the latter agreed to ‘recommend’ to its member organisations that cover would only be obtainable for those among their client base adhering to the spirit and practice of the ACS.

Yet another: ‘We advise you to do it, but it’s not mandatory’-type slice of verbiage. I’m sorry, but that wasn’t good enough then and it certainly isn’t in today’s world.

Give someone the opportunity to tread the path of least resistance and they’ll do so. It’s human nature, isn’t it? Unless, of course, you happen to be blessed with a soupcon of morals and/or scruples. In my experience, those traits do seem to be in short supply in this materialistic age wherein “I’m alright, Jack” is very much the mantra.

Today, security is not about the self-interest element and all about the public good. With the threat of terrorism ever-present, security must be solely focused on protecting the interests of the general populus at large and the CNI, etc and less about feathering the nests of fat cat shareholders.

Andrew White made a very good point in our one-on-one chat when he mentioned the subject of swine flu. If an officer turns up for duty with a stinking cold, the sensible course of action is to send that person home. If they do have swine flu, they could well end up passing on germs that would debilitate half (or maybe more) of the workforce.

However, as things stand that officer will turn around and say that he or she cannot afford the time off work. Well, if proper sick pay schemes were in place (as proposed by the CQM), there wouldn’t be an issue, would there?

For his part, Terry O’Neil feels that the CQM is actually better than the brilliant Contract of Substance he devised back in 2002. The launch event certainly saw the Cream of the Crop in attendance, so people are most definitely sitting up and taking notice.

Complete revamp of the ACS

A prominent and respected voice in the industry for many years now, John Legge – director at the PCL Whitehall Security Group – chatted to me for ten minutes or so before everyone dispersed.

He spoke primarily of the exemplary Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer contract his company has been running for nigh on 30 years now, and with which I’m very familiar thanks to John's submissions for the Security Excellence Awards.

“None of the officers work over 42 hours a week on that contract,” he said. “They enjoy 28 days’ paid holiday every year. They are properly and regularly supervised by line management. Their corporate suit-style uniforms are free, and replaced twice every year. Pension schemes are in place.”

In short, PCL Whitehall is doing things the right way, and in line with the CQM. “The only way forward in this industry is for us to have a total revamp of the ACS,” concluded Legge. “Of course, we can also continue to raise standards through the ongoing work of the NSI and the BSIA.”

Editor Bobby Logue posted the news of the CQM launch on Infologue.com yesterday afternoon, and fielded several calls from industry luminaries not long after ‘going live’ at 3.00 pm.

Constructive debate is what we need

It’s fair to say that the NSI’s move certainly seems to have started people talking, and that can only be a good thing.

Without debate we will never begin to position this industry where it needs to be in UK plc: at the front and centre of both the political and business agendas.

Do we really want to wait until we wake up once again to front page pictures of people covered in blood fleeing the scene of the next terrorist bomb attack, knowing that something could have been done to prevent it?

I don’t think so. It’s well past the time when clients should have put their money where their mouth is - recession or no recession.