‘Ask For Angela’ safety initiative to be rolled out across London venues

The ‘Ask for Angela’ initiative, which aims to make nightlife safer for vulnerable people, is set to be extended across London over the next few weeks.

As the capital emerges out of lockdown, and with venues fully open again, many hospitality staff in the city have been newly trained in line with the iniative, which has been launched by Mayor of London Sadiq Khan alongside the Metropolitan Police and Safer Sounds.

The ‘Ask for Angela’ initiative, whereby a person who feels they’re under threat can use a code word to let a member of staff or security know, follows a US campaign which suggested clubbers to ask for an ‘angel shot’. That was adapted to ‘Ask for Angela’ in 2016 when it was first introduced to UK nightlife.

Speaking about the new initiative to PA, Deputy Assistant Commissioner Jane Connors hopes that the new initiative will be widely adopted, saying: “As clubs re-open now, there have been over 350 venues that have had the training, and about 500 to 600 staff, which is a really positive step.”

Connors adds that while “violent crime and targeting people has not risen to the levels that it was at pre-pandemic,” the new initiative is working to “prevent incidents from happening”.

Ian Graham, chief licensing officer with the Metropolitan Police, added: “This isn’t a Met scheme per se, this is a partnership between ourselves and the industry. The Met is there to support the businesses but the frontline will be the businesses.”

Find out more about ‘Ask for Angela’ here.

This is the latest rollout in a series of campaign designed to increase awareness of women’s safety, both in clubs and bars, and more widely in society. One of those, Change The Lineup, is a poster campaign which aims to raise awareness of sexual harassment in clubs.