Martyn's Law for places of worship, done properly.
Major festivals, weddings and funerals, the biggest service of the year: if it's reasonable to expect 200 or more people at once, staff and volunteers included, Standard Tier likely applies.
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The buildings this law covers are ordinary, well-run places. The duties are about procedures and people, and nothing requires building work.
Why places of worship use MartynsLawPack
The law asks for workable procedures and staff who are aware of them. Doing it yourself means turning the official guidance into four procedures for your building, briefing everyone and keeping the records current as things change. MartynsLawPack takes most of that work off your hands, and you stay in charge of checking and signing off.
No blank page to start from
Answer about ten minutes of plain questions and your four procedures are written for you, ready to check and sign off.
Written for your building
Your procedures use your own entrances, your exits and the room you would move people to, in your own words, not a general template you have to adapt.
Staff made aware, on record
Stewards, welcomers and volunteers each get a link, read the procedures and tick to confirm. You can see at a glance who hasn't yet.
A record you can show
Every version is kept, with who signed it off, when, and which staff confirmed it. If the SIA asks, one download holds your current documents, sign-off records and staff log.
It stays up to date
You get a reminder before each review. Change an answer and a new version is written for you to sign off.
Simple to start, easy to stop
One premises is £39 a month plus VAT, with no minimum term. Cancel from your account whenever you like.
How it works
Answer plain questions
About your building, your services, and the biggest days in your calendar.
Check and sign off your documents
Procedures written for your premises and versioned. The responsible person signs them off.
Staff confirm they've read them
Stewards, welcomers, volunteers and office staff: each one confirms online, and the log shows who hasn't yet.
What you'll actually see
These panels show the kind of thing MartynsLawPack generates for your venue. They are illustrations, not screenshots.
Questions anyone on your rota can answer
Straightforward questions in four short sections, each with a note on what it's for.
Guided assessmentWhich part of the building is furthest from the street, with the fewest windows?
What it's for: the place you'd move people to if leaving were more dangerous than staying. Your invacuation procedure names it.
Procedures that name your actual rooms and entrances
Written for your building and your biggest gatherings, versioned and signed off.
Procedure generatorInvacuation procedure: Your Place of Worship
Moving people to safety inside
If it's safer to keep people inside than to leave, the lead steward moves the congregation and volunteers to the hall behind the worship space, away from the street-facing entrance.
The lead steward confirms the count with the door team, and nobody returns to the main space until the all-clear is given.
An awareness log built for volunteers as much as staff
Rotas change and people come and go. Each person confirms online or on paper, and anyone still on an old version shows up at a glance.
Staff awareness log| Name | Role | Version | Date | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| M. Adeyemi | Lead steward | v2 | 12 Jun | Confirmed |
| R. Kaur | Welcome team | v2 | 12 Jun | Confirmed |
| D. Halloran | Volunteer steward | v1 | 28 Apr | Link sent |
2 of 3 have confirmed the current version. One link sent, not yet confirmed.
What the law requires
The Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Act 2025 is expected in force in spring 2027. Places of worship are treated differently from most premises: where worship is the building's principal use, Standard Tier applies whenever it is reasonable to expect 200 or more people at once, staff and volunteers included, whatever the size of the gathering. Three duties apply at this tier, and a fourth where responsibility is shared or premises sit inside one another:
Notify the SIA
Your premises details lodged with the regulator.
More detail
The Security Industry Authority regulates the Act. The responsible person must tell the SIA that the premises are in scope and keep those details up to date. Premises already in scope get three months from the day the notification duty starts, and later changes have 28-day windows. The SIA's notification portal isn't open yet. It's being tested with volunteers, and it'll be on GOV.UK.
Have procedures in place
Evacuation, invacuation, lockdown, communication.
More detail
You need appropriate, workable procedures, so far as is reasonably practicable, ready to follow if an attack happened at or near your premises. Writing them down isn't a legal requirement at this tier, but the guidance says you should, and it's how you show they exist. Nothing requires you to buy equipment or alter the building, though a small change, such as how a door locks, can sometimes be a reasonable step.
Make staff aware
Everyone with a role knows the procedures and their part.
More detail
Procedures only work if the people on your floor know them and their own part in them. A briefing from you counts, and there's no course to buy. A record of who was made aware, and when, is how you show it later.
Co-ordinate with others
When responsibility is shared, or premises sit inside one another.
More detail
If more than one person is responsible for your premises, or your premises and other qualifying premises sit one inside the other, such as a bar in a shopping centre or a station, you must co-ordinate with the others so far as is reasonably practicable. Reviewing your procedures isn't a duty in itself, but the guidance recommends it, and procedures that no longer fit your premises stop being appropriate.
Counting for the threshold uses your busiest realistic gathering: the major festival, the packed wedding or funeral, the biggest service of the year, with staff and volunteers included. And if your building mainly operates as something else, say a concert venue or visitor attraction that also hosts worship, the normal thresholds apply instead. Not sure where you land? Check your tier in 60 seconds.
What Standard Tier does not require
- No equipment to buy and no building work required. A small change, like how a door locks, can sometimes be a reasonable step.
- No training courses to buy. Briefing your own staff and volunteers counts.
- You don't have to use any outside company or product, this one included.
- The big penalties in the headlines are Enhanced Tier's. At this tier the maximum civil penalty is £10,000 for each breach.
What it does ask: workable procedures, staff who know them, and the SIA notified. Records are how you show all three, and records are what MartynsLawPack does.
Pricing
One price that grows with the number of premises you run. Monthly, plus VAT, with no minimum term.
One premises
A single premises, with everything included
£39 /month + VAT
- Guided assessment for the premises
- Four procedure documents, written and versioned
- Sign-off by the responsible person
- Staff awareness log, with no limit on staff
- Review reminders and one-click downloads
- Email support
Two to five premises
One price covers all of them
£99 /month + VAT
- Everything above, for every premises
- A head-office screen across them all
- Manager logins at no extra cost
- The whole account in one download
Six premises or more
For groups, chains and estates of any size
£15 /month + VAT for each premises from the sixth
- Everything in the two to five plan, for every premises
- Six premises is £114 a month in total
- From the 26th premises, each one adds £10
- From the 101st premises, each one adds £7
- Sign up online for up to 1,000 premises
How paying works: monthly, plus VAT, taken by card through Stripe. No minimum term and no notice period. Cancel from your account and the next payment doesn't happen. The pricing page has the full ladder and works out the price for any number of premises.
The questions venues ask us
Do our volunteers count toward the numbers?
Yes. The Act counts the individuals present, and that includes staff, contractors and volunteers alongside the congregation. Stewards, welcomers, musicians, the people serving tea afterwards: they all go into the number it is reasonable to expect at once. For many places of worship, volunteers are most of the team, which is why the awareness log here treats them exactly like staff.
Our biggest festivals draw well over a thousand people. Are we still Standard Tier?
In most cases, yes. Places of worship are treated differently by the Act: where worship is the building's principal use, the premises stay in the Standard Tier at any size of 200 or more, however large the biggest gathering gets. The caveat is a building that mainly operates as something else, say a concert venue or visitor attraction that also hosts worship: there the normal thresholds apply, and it is worth taking advice. The free 60-second tier checker walks you through it.
We only fill the building a few times a year. Does that count?
The test is whether it is reasonable to expect the numbers from time to time, not every week. A modest congregation on an ordinary weekend with a packed building every Easter, Eid or Yom Kippur can still be in scope, because those big occasions are predictable. It is about your busiest realistic gathering, not your average one.
When does this become enforceable?
The Act received Royal Assent on 3 April 2025 and the Home Office published the statutory guidance in April 2026. The Security Industry Authority, which regulates the Act, expects it to come into force in spring 2027, with the exact date to be confirmed. Venues that leave it until then will be sorting paperwork in a rush alongside everyone else.
Be ready long before you're asked to be.
Sixty seconds tells you where your venue stands. Leave an email address and we send a plain-English note whenever the official position moves.
Prefer to talk it through? Call 0203 886 0170 - you'll get a real person, not a queue.