Security Staff and Handcuffs: What the Law in England and Wales Allows, and What Your Policy Should Say

Every so often a video of security staff handcuffing someone does the rounds, and the same question follows it: why do security carry handcuffs at all, and are they even allowed to use them?

It is a fair question, and the honest answer is more useful to a security business than either "never" or "whenever you like". Handcuffs can be used lawfully by security staff. They can also turn a lawful arrest into an assault if they go on at the wrong time, for the wrong reason, or in the wrong way. This guide is for owners and managers who need to decide whether their teams carry them, and what has to be in place if they do.

This post covers the law in England and Wales. It is general guidance, not legal advice for a particular incident.

Owning handcuffs is not the same as using them

There is no special licence to buy or carry handcuffs. The Security Industry Authority put it plainly in a published response on handcuff use (2020): "There is no law in the UK that prevents civilians carrying handcuffs."

The same response says the SIA "neither endorses nor declines to endorse handcuff use", and makes the point that matters most: "SIA licensed security operatives have no legal powers over and above other civilians." An SIA licence does not give anyone a power to restrain. Whatever a door supervisor or guard can lawfully do, any member of the public could lawfully do in the same situation.

So the question is never "can my staff carry cuffs?". It is "when would putting them on someone be lawful, and how do we make sure it is done safely?"

The power to arrest: section 24A of PACE

Security staff who detain someone are almost always relying on the any-person power of arrest in section 24A of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984. It has three parts, and all of them have to be met.

1. An indictable offence. A person other than a constable may arrest anyone who is in the act of committing an indictable offence, or anyone they have reasonable grounds for suspecting to be committing one. Where an indictable offence has already been committed, they may arrest anyone guilty of it, or anyone they have reasonable grounds to suspect is guilty. "Indictable" includes offences triable either way, not just the most serious crimes (Interpretation Act 1978, Schedule 1). It does not cover summary-only offences.

2. A necessary reason. The person making the arrest must have reasonable grounds for believing the arrest is necessary to prevent the person:

• causing physical injury to themselves or anyone else
• suffering physical injury
• causing loss of or damage to property
• making off before a constable can assume responsibility for them

3. No constable who can do it instead. It must appear to the person making the arrest that it is not reasonably practicable for a constable to make it instead.

That third condition is easy to miss. The power exists to hold the situation until the police can take over, not to replace them. If a constable is already on the scene and able to act, the power is not available. If police are on their way, the question is whether it appears to you that it is not reasonably practicable for a constable to make the arrest instead, and you should be able to say why afterwards. One of the four reasons, stopping the person making off before a constable can assume responsibility for them, shows the shape of it: hold, then hand over. Call the police at the start, not once the person is cuffed.

Reasonable force, every single time

Putting handcuffs on someone is a use of force. Section 3 of the Criminal Law Act 1967 allows "such force as is reasonable in the circumstances in the prevention of crime, or in effecting or assisting in the lawful arrest of offenders or suspected offenders".

Section 76 of the Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008 explains how that is judged. The force is assessed on the circumstances as the person believed them to be, and it is not reasonable if it was disproportionate in those circumstances. The law also accepts that someone acting for a legitimate purpose "may not be able to weigh to a nicety the exact measure of any necessary action".

In practice this means two separate decisions, both of which your staff need to be able to explain afterwards:

1. Was the arrest itself lawful under section 24A?
2. Was handcuffing a reasonable and proportionate level of force for this person, at this moment?

A lawful arrest does not make handcuffs automatically reasonable. Someone who has stopped resisting and is waiting quietly for the police may not need restraining at all. The SIA's response makes the same point from the other direction: anyone who carries handcuffs should be aware that "their use could constitute a crime" unless they can show it was "reasonable and proportionate in the circumstances".

Training is a health and safety duty

You will hear people say a security guard "needs a certificate" to use handcuffs. We are not aware of any law that requires a specific certificate to use handcuffs. But that does not mean training is optional.

Handcuffs are a restraint that can hurt someone if they are applied badly, left on too tight, or used on a person in the wrong position. That brings them squarely under health and safety law:

• The Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974, section 2 requires employers, so far as is reasonably practicable, to provide safe systems of work and "such information, instruction, training and supervision as is necessary" for the health and safety of their employees.
• Section 3 of the same Act extends the duty to people who are not your employees but may be affected by your work. We read that as covering the person being restrained.
• The Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 require a suitable and sufficient risk assessment covering both groups, and regulation 13 requires adequate health and safety training when staff are exposed to new or increased risks, repeated periodically where appropriate.

These duties are owed to your employees. If your guards are agency or self-employed, the position is different and you should take advice.

If you issue handcuffs, or allow staff to carry their own on your contracts, you have introduced a risk. The risk assessment and the training follow from that.

It is also worth knowing what the licence training does not cover. The SIA's published outline of door supervisor training (May 2022) lists the physical intervention sessions as an introduction to physical skills, disengagement techniques and escorting techniques. Handcuffs are not on that list. If your staff carry them, they need separate training in handcuffs from a provider you have checked, covering application, checks and removal, with refresher training on a schedule you set and record. Check what your insurer expects before anyone is issued a set.

Handcuffs or the ground?

The alternative to handcuffs is often holding someone on the ground. The SIA's guidance on reducing risk in physical intervention explains why that is dangerous. Positional asphyxia "occurs mostly in ground restraints where a person is held face down or face up on the floor", and "people have died from positional asphyxia". The guidance is direct: avoid taking someone to the ground wherever possible, avoid pressure on the chest, stomach or neck, and let go as soon as you can, because "the longer you hold someone in these types of positions, the more likely it is that you will harm them or kill them".

The SIA's guidance covers manual restraint and does not mention handcuffs. The argument usually made for them is that, applied properly by someone trained, they can shorten a hold and take weight off a person's body. In our view that argument has force, but it only holds if the training is real. Badly applied handcuffs cause injuries of their own, and a person in cuffs is still at risk if left face down. The SIA adds a warning every trainer should repeat: "just because someone can speak, it does not mean that they can breathe properly."

What police think will vary

In our experience, the response you get from police varies from area to area. Some forces are supportive of trained security staff using handcuffs where it is justified. Others take a dimmer view of it.

Do not leave your teams to find out on the night. If you hold contracts where staff carry handcuffs, it is worth knowing how your local force views it and making sure your handover procedure is clear.

Record every use

If handcuffs go on, the report is not optional. It is your evidence that the arrest was lawful and the force was reasonable, and it has to be written while the details are fresh, not pieced together days later. Every report should cover:

• the date, time and exact location
• what the guard saw, and the offence they believed was being or had been committed
• which of the section 24A reasons made the arrest necessary
• why a constable could not make the arrest instead
• why handcuffs were used, rather than a lesser option
• what time they went on, what time they came off, and what checks were made in between
• any injuries, to anyone
• the names and contact details of witnesses
• photos, and a note of any CCTV or body-worn video that exists
• the time police were called, the time they arrived, and the name or collar number of the constable who took over

If your guards use TacDesk, the guard app includes a separate Use of Force report by default. It asks for the date, time and location, the type of force used (mechanical restraint is one of the options), the justification, whether de-escalation was tried, injuries to the person and to staff, the staff involved and any witnesses, whether police were called and the reference number, and whether body-worn video was running. There is a full account field for the rest of the list above. Guards can attach photos, and the report will not file until it has been signed.

What to put in your policy

If your company allows handcuffs on any contract, the policy should answer these questions in writing:

• Who may carry them. Named, trained staff only, with training records and refresher dates held centrally.
• Which sites. Not every contract justifies them. Agree it with the client and record why.
• When they may be used. Only during a lawful arrest under section 24A, and only where the force is reasonable and proportionate.
• How they are applied and checked. In line with the training provider's method, including checks for tightness and breathing, and never leaving someone face down.
• When they come off. As soon as they are no longer needed, and always at handover.
• Handover. Police called at the start, and responsibility passed to a constable on arrival.
• Reporting. A full incident report for every use, reviewed by a manager.
• Review. Every use looked at by someone senior, with lessons fed back into training.
• Retention. How long you keep these reports, witness details and any body-worn video, since all of it is personal data.

Handcuffs are a tool, not a power. The power comes from the law of arrest, the limits come from the law on reasonable force, and the duty to train comes from health and safety law. Get those three right, write them down, and your staff will be able to explain every decision they made.

Want every use of force written up on the night, with the time, place, photos and signature captured? See how TacDesk handles incident reporting for UK security companies.