Leading provider of security training, quality assurance, consulting and software solutions, Redline Assured Security, part of Air Partner Group, a Wheels Up company, has established a new partnership with security management company Weston FM Group. Weston FM Group specialises in a range of services including security, mobile patrol and alarm response, alarm and CCTV monitoring, fire protection systems and commercial cleaning.
The new partnership, which has been a topic of discussion for a few years between close former colleagues, Redline Managing Director Paul Mason, and Weston FM Group founder Simon Weston CBE, brings together high-level complementary expertise with a commitment to strengthen preparedness for and prevention of terrorist attacks, with the aim of preventing recurrence of an attack similar to the tragic Manchester Arena bombing.
The first stage of the partnership will see Redline providing training for the entire Weston FM Group workforce – mobile patrol, security guards and cleaning personnel (over 180 people) - in Behaviour Detection Awareness.
Paul Mason says: “The vision for the new partnership is to improve security culture and security skills so that greater focus can be effectively applied to risk assessment, preparedness and prevention. In our former military and current security environments, Simon and I have always taken the same approach – to be pre-emptive and to do the right thing first time.”
Simon Weston CBE, says: “Our new partnership will reinforce Weston FM Group’s goals to not only provide the best solutions but also to continuously innovate and improve. It will also provide exemplary training and potential career development opportunities for the Weston FM Group workforce, bringing us one step closer to an enhanced security sector. “
On 19 December 2022, the government announced its outline for the ‘Protect Duty’, new anti-terrorism draft legislation, to be known as Martyn’s Law. As the security sector and wider general public await the spring publication of the draft legislation. Redline will begin training the first cohort of Weston FM Group personnel in Behaviour Detection Awareness to enable them to recognise early indicators that something could be awry and suspicious through careful observation of the behaviour of people.
By heightening the skills to detect abnormal behaviour or signs, for example, someone loitering outside the same building every day for a week, someone carrying a conspicuously heavy suitcase through a shopping centre, or a venue door left open overnight, security officers, safety stewards or cleaning personnel can identify a potentially suspicious and evolving situation at the earliest and first possible stage.
Wherever Weston FM Group personnel are deployed, be that to a crowded shopping centre on a Saturday, a business park mid-week or a stadium for an international football match, each person will be appropriately trained by Redline to recognise features of behaviour that are unusual, to carry out a response, and to know how to escalate appropriately.
Paul Mason is advocating the systemic roll out of Behaviour Detection Awareness training across businesses and venue operators nationwide. Implementable with minimal budget, the cost should not be an obstacle to enhanced training for security personal and the wider workforce if the result is prevention of terrorist attacks on the general public.