Martyn’s Law: what changed, what didn’t, and what you can stop worrying about.

By Simon Mosley — Ackle. Twenty years in commercial access control, CCTV and networks.

If you run a pub, a village hall, a small theatre, a community centre, a busy café, a faith building, a school hall, a fitness studio, a conference room, or a function venue — you’ve probably had an email in the last few months telling you to brace for Martyn’s Law. Some have been useful. Most have been written to sell you something.

I’ve been installing security systems in Yorkshire for twenty years, and I want to be straight with you about what this law actually says, who it applies to, and what most venues genuinely don’t need to panic about. Including, in many cases, whether you need to spend money on new kit at all.

What the law actually is

The official name is the Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Act 2025. It got Royal Assent in April 2025 and is commonly known as Martyn’s Law, in memory of Martyn Hett, one of the 22 people killed in the 2017 Manchester Arena attack. His mother Figen Murray campaigned for years to get this on the statute book.

The law’s aim is simple: make sure venues open to the public have thought about what they’d do if a terrorist attack happened there. Not stop attacks — nobody’s claiming a village hall can do that — but be prepared enough to reduce harm.

The Home Office published its final statutory guidance in April 2026. The Act won’t actually be enforceable until at least spring 2027, giving venues a 24-month implementation window. You have time. Anyone telling you to act in panic this week is selling something.

The two tiers — and the most important number on this page

The Act splits qualifying premises into two tiers based on the number of people who might be present at the same time. This is the number everything turns on.

Standard tier — 200 to 799 people

Most venues that fall under the Act are in this tier. Mid-sized pubs, restaurants, places of worship, function rooms, community centres, smaller theatres, gyms, larger shops, schools, libraries.

The standard tier requirements are about preparedness, not equipment:

• Notifying the regulator (the SIA) that you’re a qualifying premises
• Having procedures for evacuation, “invacuation” (sheltering inside), lockdown, and communication
• Making sure relevant staff know those procedures

Enhanced tier — 800 or more people

Larger premises and events — bigger theatres, concert venues, sports grounds, larger conference centres, certain festivals. This tier is genuinely a step up. In addition to the standard-tier duties, enhanced-tier premises must:

• Carry out a terrorism risk assessment
• Implement protective security measures — so far as is reasonably practicable
• Have a designated senior officer responsible for compliance
• Keep documented evidence of all of the above
• Submit certain documents to the SIA on notification

“Reasonably practicable” is the key phrase. The law doesn’t expect a community festival to install airport-style screening. It expects you to do what’s sensible and proportionate to the venue, the audience, and the risk.

Things that aren’t true that you might have been told

“You need to bring in expensive consultants.”

You don’t. The Home Office and the SIA have been explicit that the law isn’t designed to need expert consultants for standard-tier premises. ProtectUK (the official police-led resource) publishes free guidance, free e-learning, and free risk-assessment tools. The government has built this so any competent venue manager can comply without hiring anyone.

“You need to install CCTV / access control / bollards immediately.”

You don’t. If you’re in the standard tier, none of these are mandated. If you’re in the enhanced tier, you have to consider protective measures — but only ones that are reasonably practicable for your venue. Bollards on a 200-capacity church car park aren’t reasonably practicable. CCTV may or may not be, depending on the venue.

“You’ll be inspected and fined if you don’t comply by April 2027.”

The SIA has said publicly that it will take a risk-based, proportionate approach to enforcement. The vast majority of standard-tier premises won’t be routinely inspected. Enforcement will focus on enhanced-tier venues and on premises where there’s a real concern. Fines are at the top of an escalation ladder, not the first response to a missed deadline.

“Your existing fire and health-and-safety plans aren’t enough.”

For many standard-tier venues, your existing fire evacuation plan does a lot of what the standard tier asks for. You’ll need to extend it to cover lockdown and invacuation scenarios, and train staff on those — but you’re building on what you already have, not starting from scratch. The Home Office’s own guidance acknowledges this.

What you should actually do

Whether you’re in standard or enhanced tier, the practical starting point is the same:

1. Work out which tier you’re in. Calculate your realistic maximum capacity — including staff — using safe-occupancy numbers or historical attendance. Under 200? You’re out of scope. 200–799? Standard. 800+? Enhanced.
2. Read the official guidance. ProtectUK and gov.uk have the statutory guidance and supplementary documents free to download. Start there, not with an installer’s email.
3. Audit your existing procedures. Fire plan, health-and-safety plan, lone-worker plan — what already covers evacuation, communication and roles? Where are the gaps for lockdown and invacuation?
4. Train your staff. The SIA endorses ACT Awareness (a free 45-minute e-learning) and ACT Security for those who want more depth. Both are free.
5. Document everything. Standard tier doesn’t need to submit anything to the SIA, but you should keep your own evidence. Enhanced tier does need to submit.

When does an installer like us actually help?

Honestly? Less often than the industry would like you to believe. Here’s where security kit becomes genuinely useful:

• Enhanced-tier venues doing a real terrorism risk assessment, where CCTV with reliable footage retrieval, controlled access at staff entrances, and lockdown-capable door systems become reasonably practicable measures.
• Multi-purpose venues where the same building hosts capacity-varying events — a community hall that runs a 150-person yoga class on Tuesday and an 850-person wedding on Saturday. The Saturday tips you into enhanced.
• Venues where the procedures themselves need supporting kit — an effective lockdown procedure needs doors that can actually lock from a single point, intercoms or PA for communication, and CCTV that lets you see what’s happening before you make a decision.

If you’re in one of those situations, then yes, a survey is worth having. If you’re a 180-capacity village hall worrying about compliance, you don’t need us — you need to read the ProtectUK guidance, write a one-page procedure, and train your volunteers. That’s the actual law.

What Ackle does and doesn’t do

We’re a commercial security installer based in North Yorkshire, covering Yorkshire and Tees Valley. We design and install access control, CCTV, intercom systems and the electrical works that go with them.

We’re not a Martyn’s Law consultancy. We’re not selling compliance services. We’re not telling you what your tier is or writing your procedures for you. If a venue operator does need physical security as part of a genuine enhanced-tier response — or just wants to upgrade what they have because the building needs it anyway — that’s our work, and we’ll quote it honestly.

If you’re unsure what tier you’re in or what to do next, the ProtectUK guidance is the place to start. If, after reading it, you decide you need a security survey, we’re happy to do one. If not, you’ve saved yourself the cost of a system you didn’t need.