代写加拿大Assignment: Individual Case Study

　　Module title: Strategic Human Resource Management

　　Word Limit: 3000 Words produced in Microsoft Word

　　SECTION 2

　　Individual Case Study Report: G4S Olympic Security Fiasco

　　G4S, the private security company that was contracted to supply security services to the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games, has admitted few days before the opening ceremony that it would not be able to recruit and retain enough staff for the events, forcing LOCOG to bring in military personnel. Britain’s armed forces are to provide an additional 3,500 troops for security duty at the Olympic Games amid fears in Whitehall to supply all the guards it is contracted to deliver. G4S – the world’s biggest security company – was unable to supply all of the 10,000-plus guards it has promised. In a development that has caused fury at the top of the Ministry of Defence, the armed forces sent extra troops on top of the 13,500 personnel that they have already agreed to supply. “This is an unacceptable situation,” said a senior MoD figure. “The MoD has a huge amount on its plate, what with the deployment in Helmand and the overhaul currently taking place in the armed forces. This additional requirement is a huge demand. It inevitably means that some of the troops on guard duty at the games will be people recently back from Afghanistan”.

　　Mark Hamilton, the managing director of G4S’s security personnel, recently told the Financial Times that running out of time was the biggest risk to the Olympics security recruitment operation. At the end of May, G4S said only 3,000 guards were ready to be deployed at the games. In a statement, G4S said “the company is entering the final stages of an extremely complex workforce supply contract, which is on an unprecedented scale. The statement continued: "We have recently encountered significant difficulties in processing applicants in sufficient numbers through the necessary training, vetting and accreditation procedures. As a result, we will be unable to deliver all of the necessary workforce numbers. We have worked very closely with LOCOG throughout the build up. At the point we felt that we could no longer assure the scale of the security workforce we had committed to, we advised them of the situation. The Government has therefore decided to increase the number of military personnel who will work at the Games. "We are grateful for the additional military support. We do not underestimate the impact on the military personnel and their families and express our appreciation to them”. The statement added: "The Company deeply regrets that, despite the relentless efforts of so many of its people, it is unlikely to deliver in full its obligations to LOCOG, to the Government and to everyone with an interest in these Games”. Our immediate priority is to work with LOCOG and the military to ensure the necessary workforce delivery. When the Games are finished, the Board will conduct a full review of our performance on delivering this contract”.

　　One person familiar with the recruitment process said the concerns focused on G4S’s inability to adequately roster its new recruits in the lead-up to the games. “This is a tough ask to recruit that many people from a temporary employmentpool,” they said.

　　James Brokenshire, minister for security, said that the Home Office had been monitoring arrangements for several months but the problems with rostering staff came up a fortnight ago. “G4S over the last 24 hours have done the responsible thing in saying there is a significant problem,” he told the BBC’s Today programme. He added that as part of the £553m security budget allocated to pay guards, with fewer guards delivered, the salary bill would be less. Dame Tessa Jowell, the shadow Olympics minister and member of the Olympics board, confirmed that if G4S had failed to deliver on their contractual obligations, they would be paid less.

　　Keith Vaz, chair of the home affairs select committee, said he had called Nick Buckles, G4S chief executive, to appear before the committee next week to explain the situation. “Considering the assurances we have been given in the past this is very serious and we expect a full explanation from a company that not only have the Olympic contract, but receive hundreds of millions of pounds from the Home Office and other government departments each year,” he said.

　　Mr Hamilton said at the time that he was “quietly confident” G4S could meet its recruitment target. However, on Wednesday G4S said the company had “encountered some issues in relation to workforce supply and scheduling” over the past couple of weeks. “This has been an unprecedented and very complex security recruitment, training and deployment exercise which has been carried out to a tight timescale,” it added. He also said: “we deeply regret that and we are deeply disappointed. It was a daunting task to supply that number of staff in a short time scale. I began to know it was going wrong eight or nine days ago... Basically we are recruiting a large number of people and they are all working through a process of interview, two or three different degrees of training, licensing and accreditation”.

　　The Home Office confirmed on Wednesday evening that it had agreed to “offer help to G4S” by “revising the level of military support”. The defence secretary is expected to explain the arrangements to parliament on Thursday. Ms May, the home secretary, is thought to have phoned G4S executives last week to question them on their progress in recruiting guards. But she distanced herself from the debacle in the House of Commons on Monday, telling MPs that the G4S contract was held by Locog, and not the Home Office, and it was the games organisers who were responsible for managing the deal.

　　Late last year G4S was asked to double the number of guards it is providing for the games, after the Home Office and Locog realised it needed more than 23,000 personnel to protect Olympic venues. According to figures from the public accounts committee, the estimated costs of the G4S contract rose accordingly from £86m in December 2010 to £284m a year later, but it is unclear whether the deal will be renegotiated after the Olympics.

　　One person involved in Olympic security discussions said that “there may be conversations about the contract” after the games. As a result of this additional request, the military’s presence at the games will now be heightened. “Many of the people the public will meet at the point of entry to any Olympic event will now be a serving member of the armed forces,” said an MoD official. LOCOG denied that the last-minute call on the army would spark fears about the strength of the Olympic security operation. “Security for the games is big and complex but we have the best brains in the security business working on this – Home Office, Metropolitan Police, MoD and world’s largest private security business,” it said.