Martyn’s Law checklist for schools

Three facts that change the work

Scope and responsibility

Half an hour, once.

• Confirm whether 200 or more people may be expected on site at the same time, from time to time — staff included.
• If not, you are out of scope entirely. Preparing anyway is sensible; being told you must is not accurate.
• Identify the responsible person. Schedule 1 points at the governing body, or the proprietor where there is none, and at the local authority for a pupil referral unit.
• For a trust, get this written down with advice. It is the question that takes longest.
• Record the conclusion somewhere a successor will find it.

The four procedures

Read your existing plans against these four headings.

• Evacuation. You have this. Does it work for something that is not a fire? Is there a second assembly point?
• Invacuation. Moving people to a safer place inside. Written down? Practised? Which rooms?
• Lockdown. Written, almost certainly. Practised? Does it distinguish full lockdown from securing one block?
• Communication. How would you tell every member of staff something specific within two minutes, including the field, the hall and a trip? This is the honest gap in most schools.
• Write down which of the four is weakest. That is your priority.

People

Procedures nobody knows about are not in place.

• Every member of staff knows what each instruction means and what to do.
• It is in induction, not only in the September INSET.
• Supply and peripatetic staff are covered by something, even a one-page card.
• Free ACT e-learning from ProtectUK is a sensible baseline and costs nothing.
• You can show who has been briefed — a list, not an assumption.

Practice and evidence

The highest-value hour you will spend.

• Run a communication test this term — just telling everyone something and seeing how long it takes.
• Run a lockdown drill and an invacuation drill this year.
• Time them, and note who you missed.
• Write three paragraphs per drill: date, scenario, what happened, what changed.
• Put emergency preparedness on the risk register with a named owner and a review date.
• Report it to governors annually.

Then, and only then

Equipment, for honest reasons.

• Only after the procedures are sound, and only for the incidents you actually have.
• The gate, the toilets, the keys, the holidays — not the legislation.
• Ask any supplier the questions in this checklist.
• Be sceptical of anyone quoting a deadline, a fine, or the possibility that you are enhanced tier.
• Remember there is nothing to notify yet: section 9 has not commenced and the SIA portal is still being built.