Vetting levels for local authority CCTV staff

Why we have published this page

In April 2026 the Framework Service Level Agreement was revised. Section 4 of the Framework Service Level Agreement now states that “Local Authority staff should be vetted to the nationally agreed minimum standard of NPPV Level 2 (Abbreviated)”. The revised edition was published on GOV.UK on 13 April 2026. Earlier editions, including the edition first published in 2021, referred to a “nationally agreed minimum standard” without naming any level.

Since the revision was published, many of our members have contacted us, concerned that a national document now appears to set a minimum police vetting level for every local authority CCTV control room Operator. We have looked for the national agreement the sentence refers to and have not found one. The revised Framework Service Level Agreement does not cite any agreement, the body that reached it or the date it was reached.

What the Framework Service Level Agreement is, and is not

The Framework Service Level Agreement (revised April 2026) describes itself as guidance. Its introduction says that it “is not in itself an SLA but a tool to help you ensure you have included all the minimum requirements that would be expected to be included in an SLA”. The Framework Service Level Agreement is published on GOV.UK by the Biometrics and Surveillance Camera Commissioner, and police forces will treat it as carrying government authority. That makes the wording of Section 4 of the Framework Service Level Agreement more important to get right, but it does not change what the document is. Guidance cannot set a vetting level for a role. As explained below, that is a decision for each police force, made against the risk in a particular role at a particular site.

A level described as “nationally agreed” will nevertheless be quoted as if it were a national standard, and a minimum places no limit on what a police force may ask for. In August 2026, four months after the revision, a police force in the south east of England wrote to the councils in its area requiring NPPV Level 2 Full for every CCTV operator with access to Airwave radio, including operators who had held NPPV Level 1 until then. The “nationally agreed minimum” did not prevent that.

How the police vetting levels work

Non-police personnel vetting (NPPV) is the police vetting that applies to people who are not police officers or police staff, including council employees. The College of Policing Vetting Authorised Professional Practice (May 2025) describes the levels as follows.

• NPPV Level 1 allows unescorted access to non-sensitive police premises, but no access to classified information.
• NPPV Level 2 (Abbreviated) allows regular, unescorted access to non-sensitive police premises and access to police information up to OFFICIAL-SENSITIVE. It does not allow access to police systems.
• NPPV Level 2 Full adds unsupervised access to the police systems the role requires.

The levels also differ in who is checked. Under the College of Policing Vetting Authorised Professional Practice, NPPV Level 2 (Abbreviated) extends the checks to the applicant’s partner and the people they live with. NPPV Level 2 Full goes further, to former partners and all family members, and adds a credit reference check.

Who decides the vetting level for a role

The College of Policing sets the national framework through the College of Policing Vetting Code of Practice 2023, a statutory code issued under section 39A of the Police Act 1996, and the College of Policing Vetting Authorised Professional Practice. Within that framework the level is decided for each role. Paragraph 5.16 of the College of Policing Vetting Code of Practice 2023 states that “the vetting clearance required is related to identified risks and not the grade or rank of a post”. Paragraph 5.6.7 of the College of Policing Vetting Authorised Professional Practice (May 2025) says that the assessment “should be completed on a case-by-case basis”, so that “non-police personnel are not subjected to a disproportionate level of vetting”.

In practice, the level a role requires should rest on an assessment of the information risk at the site, owned by the police force’s Senior Information Risk Owner, and be implemented by the Force Vetting Manager. The National Police Chiefs’ Council does not set vetting levels for local authority staff.

What the national documents say about local authority CCTV staff

• The College of Policing Vetting Authorised Professional Practice (May 2025) mentions council CCTV units once, as an example of a non-police personnel role. It attaches no vetting level to them.
• Paragraph 5.17 of the College of Policing Vetting Code of Practice 2023 states that people who are provided with police information in the course of their professional duties, where that information is not obtained through direct access to or searching of police systems, “are not required to be subject to police vetting”.
• The national vetting requirements for policing, published by the Police Digital Service, name no vetting level for local authority CCTV staff.
• The Airwave Service Code of Practice (version 7.0, March 2025), issued by the Home Office Airwave Security Team, requires personnel who use an Airwave radio terminal to be cleared to the government Baseline Personnel Security Standard or equivalent.

None of these documents names NPPV Level 2 (Abbreviated), or any other level, as a national minimum for local authority CCTV staff.

Paragraph 5.17 of the College of Policing Vetting Code of Practice 2023 also states that “under no circumstances can the requirement for police vetting be negated by a clearance conducted under any other vetting regime”. Where a police force has assessed a role and shown that police vetting is required, other screening does not replace it. The question is whether that assessment has been made for your role at your site.

What a national minimum means for councils

Police vetting is not a formality for the people who apply. Some good applicants will not put their partners, households and families through police checks for a council role, and some experienced operators may decline to renew. Vetting also takes time: in its report into the effectiveness of vetting arrangements in Northumbria Police (September 2023), His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue Services recorded non-police personnel vetting applications delayed, some by over six months, while the force prioritised its own recruitment. While an application waits, a council post stays empty or is covered by overtime.

No police force has offered to meet these costs. They fall on council budgets, for a public space CCTV service that councils are not required by law to provide.

The screening councils may already have

Control rooms that operate to BS 7958:2015, the British Standard code of practice for CCTV management and operation, already screen their staff to BS 7858:2019, the British Standard for screening individuals working in a secure environment. We believe the Framework Service Level Agreement should have asked whether that screening, or the government Baseline Personnel Security Standard, is the right national baseline, with police vetting added where a police force’s risk assessment for a particular site shows that it is needed.

What we are asking for

We are asking the Biometrics and Surveillance Camera Commissioner and the National Police Chiefs’ Council to correct Section 4 of the Framework Service Level Agreement (revised April 2026) so that it reflects the case-by-case assessment the College of Policing Vetting Authorised Professional Practice requires. We propose the following wording:

“Local authority staff who require police vetting should be vetted to the level the relevant police force sets for the role. That level should follow an assessment of the information risk at that site by the force’s Senior Information Risk Owner, and be implemented by the Force Vetting Manager in line with the College of Policing Vetting Authorised Professional Practice.”

We have written to the Biometrics and Surveillance Camera Commissioner, the College of Policing and the Public CCTV Managers Association, and we would welcome joint wording with the other organisations named in the Framework Service Level Agreement.

If a police force asks your staff for a higher level

Do not refuse the requirement, and do not accept it without evidence. The level should rest on an assessment of your control room, and you are entitled to ask to see it.

The Police Vetting Toolkit takes you through the facts of your own control room and produces a letter to your police force, a summary and an evidence checklist, each referenced to the national documents.