Written question asked by Neil Gerrard (Labour) on Monday, 24 April 2006, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Wednesday, 26 April 2006. It was answered by Lord Coaker (Labour) on Tuesday, 4 July 2006 on behalf of the Home Office.

Security Industry

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what the average time for an application for registration as a door supervisor with the Security Industry Authority to be processed has been since establishment of the authority.

Answer: The SIA do not calculate average processing times. Some, such as those including overseas criminal records checks, unavoidably take a considerable time. The SIA have a published target of processing 80 per cent. of all applications within six weeks, measured from the date that a properly completed application enters the processing system to the date that a licence is issued. From April 2004 until August 2005 the SIA processed 62 per cent. within six weeks and 88 per cent. within nine weeks. Since September 2005, there has been a backlog of applications that have been waiting to enter the system. These have added an additional time of between two and four weeks to the process, so it is now taking up to 10 weeks to process most applications.

Secondary information