The Ask for Angela scheme, named after Angela Crompton, who was abused and ultimately killed by her husband, began in 2016 in London and has since become widespread across the UK and Ireland. The scheme aims to protect anyone, although it is used mostly by women, feeling uncomfortable or vulnerable in bars and nightclubs, and is generally advertised in bathrooms to maintain the secrecy of the code word and to provide a sense of security. The advertising posters invite anyone feeling vulnerable to approach the bar and ask for ‘Angela’, alerting the bar staff to the possibility of danger and triggering them to usher the person to safety. Around 350 bars and nightclubs in Northern Ireland have signed up, and recently the PSNI announced that it would be extended to music festivals.

The importance of a scheme like this is undeniable, given that over 7 in 10 women in the UK experience sexual harassment, and only 3% of women aged 18-24 have never experienced such harassment in any form. However, although this now wide-reaching scheme may appear to relieve some of the common fears of a woman, by visiting 25 pubs in London to secretly test their compliance with the scheme, the BBC recently discovered that 13 of the venues failed to appropriately respond to the code word. This has left women everywhere feeling ill at ease, demonstrating that although many venues boast their support for this scheme, whether they will be ready to help in one’s time of need remains unsure. This is due to the scheme’s lack of enforcement, leading many to consider legalisation the next step.
Although the scheme is now widely implemented, insufficient staff training is dwindling its effectiveness, meaning that a majority of advertising venues cannot actually follow through on their promises. While bar staff employed during the initial implementation of the scheme may have received training, this training has not been regularly updated, refreshed, or revisited, and was not taught to new staff upon their employment. Due to the high staff turnover inherent within the hospitality sector, a large percentage of bar staff have therefore not been versed on the training and thus are unprepared to participate despite the venue’s advertisements.
Therefore the legal issue, and the greatest barrier to the scheme being effective, is its lack of enforcement among staff, meaning that vulnerable women are being provided with a false sense of security and staff suffer no penalty for denying them this support. The question is then perhaps legalising the scheme, introducing some sort of obligation or enforcement mechanism such as a fine on the bar staff for non-compliance. This would ensure that, where the scheme is advertised, it will truly be implemented and the staff will be aware of the proper procedures or face a liability for failing to do so. To further ensure the scheme’s success, advocates for the scheme have recommended the implementation of regular refresher courses, and free resources have been made available by the scheme to aid staff training while quashing the common issue of financial pressure in the industry, leaving no room for excuses.
Iwona Kossek, a spokesperson for Ask for Angela, identified a further issue undermining the effectiveness of the scheme, this being the lack of copyrighting for its advertising posters. This allows establishments to print and portray the posters advertising their support of the scheme, allowing women a false sense of security, without staff having received the necessary training and being able to actually deliver. Copyrighting the posters would increase their reliability and would mean women could actually put their trust in them, as bars and venues would be prevented from advertising the scheme unless they were trained to provide the help that it promises.
Furthermore, the scheme and its implementation is largely funded by councils and, while some councils already include participation in the scheme as a condition for granting alcohol licences to bars and similar venues, if this were to become a more widespread requirement it would certainly increase the effectiveness of the scheme. However, the scheme itself has suggested that these conditions should be expanded to include obligatory training and regular audits for advertising venues to once again ensure that the scheme becomes more than a mere box-ticking exercise and can actually deliver on its promise. Additionally, the scheme would undoubtedly be more effective with further government support. While a government spokesperson labelled the BBC’s findings ‘deeply concerning’, they noted that the scheme is not ‘government-led’. Perhaps with wider support from the government, the scheme could be more strongly enforced and could provide more support.
Regardless of its enforcement, there has been extensive discourse regarding the scheme in recent years, with many believing that it is intrinsically flawed and that a new approach should be taken. One argument is that, where the scheme becomes so widespread and thus widely known, the secrecy of the code will be diminished, rendering it largely ineffective and potentially enabling perpetrators to learn and abuse the code, creating further danger. If the code word becomes universally recognisable to bar staff, it is likely to become recognisable to those who propose the threat in the first place.
In response to the BBC’s allegations, some bars have said that, regardless of the scheme, people should approach the bar staff openly if they feel in danger or uncomfortable and they will assist them, however either way encouraging a woman in a vulnerable position to spend an extended period at the bar seeking help could worsen her situation and make her a greater target. Additionally, whether using the scheme or simply going up to the bar to openly seek help a number of students have cited that they would be reluctant to approach the bar for help due to fear of male bartenders. This alludes to the deeper problem embedded within the scheme, this being that women should not be left to fall into a situation where they need to seek help and instead the (more often than not, male) perpetrator should be addressed.
Although the scheme has good intentions of encouraging women to seek help if they feel uncomfortable or unsafe, some suggest that the scheme contributes to victim blaming, putting the onus on the women at risk instead of dealing with the real issue at hand – the person causing her discomfort. The scheme has been described as a ‘victim-maker’ rather than a ‘perpetrator-tackler’, with many feeling that instead of waiting until a woman feels uncomfortable enough to seek help and forcing them to find ways to escape dangerous or uncomfortable situations, threatening behaviour should not be tolerated and the source of the danger should be tackled. Those who maintain this view of the scheme feel that this issue must be tackled at its very root by updating and increasing relationship and sex education in schools in order to avoid threatening behaviour occurring in the first place.
Additionally, many believe that the current lack of legislation surrounding spiking would be a good place to start with regard to tackling the issue at hand as opposed to placing the onus on the endangered, given that 25% of Belfast students participating in a recent survey have had their drink spiked and only 1 in 10 spiking instances is reported, with the remaining 90% admitting that given the lack of legislation, they didn’t see the point. The government is said to be aiming to create new legislation making drink-spiking a standalone offence punishable by up to 10 years in jail, helping to shift the focus from waiting for a targeted woman to come forward to tackling the perpetrator at hand.
It appears that, the way that things are currently, the Ask for Angela scheme is unfortunately in many cases merely a box-ticking exercise with no reliable follow through. Given that, as of 2022, violence against women and girls affects more than 1 in 3 women, and the issue is prevalent not just in bars and nightclubs but permeates any instance where a woman goes somewhere alone, better measures must be implemented. While an enforcement mechanism may be required as of now to ensure the effectiveness of the measures currently in place, greater measures must be taken. It seems that the scheme, or some kind of safety measure, must be passed into legislation in order to ensure its effectiveness. Some are hopeful that this can happen, fuelled by the entrance of Martyn’s Law, which aims to enhance public safety with regards to terrorist attacks and was similarly driven by previous tragedy and an undeniable need for change, into parliament.
In the mean time, it is important not to be lured into a false sense of security by the advertisement of this scheme, and to continue to advocate for women’s safety in the hope that the need for legislation protecting women in vulnerable situations will be recognised and fulfilled.
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