HVM Policy

Martyn’s Law and Hostile Vehicle Mitigation

NOTE – “Martyn’s Law” is the commonly used name for the Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Act 2025.

Within the legislation, there is significant emphasis on vehicle-based threats, known as “Hostile Vehicle Mitigation”

Traffic Management and Vehicle-Based Threats:

Roles, Responsibilities and Scope of Practice

Community Traffic Management Ltd (CTM): Position Statement

1. Purpose

This abridged / summary position statement sets out Community Traffic Management Ltd’s (CTM’s) professional position on the role and scope of Traffic Management (TM) in relation to vehicle-based terrorist threats at events. Traffic Management activity can contribute to overall risk reduction while remaining clearly distinct from Hostile Vehicle Mitigation (HVM) and other specialist protective security measures.

2. What Traffic Management Is – and Is Not:

For the purposes of this position statement, Traffic Management is the planned, lawful and proportionate control of vehicle and pedestrian movement associated with an event. Its key purposes include supporting public safety, maintaining appropriate access (including for emergency services), and managing the operation of the surrounding highway network.

Traffic Management is designed to manage compliant road users and lawful vehicle movement, with decisions based on safety, clarity, access and network operation. Traffic Management does not assume, assess or seek to manage hostile intent.

By contrast to Hostile Vehicle Mitigation, which is a specialist protective security discipline concerned with deliberate hostile intent. Hostile Vehicle Mitigation applies risk-led assessment, design and assurance of rated vehicle security barriers and other engineered measures intended to resist deliberate vehicle impact and reduce the likelihood and impact of vehicle-based attacks.

Traffic Management is not Hostile Vehicle Mitigation; the two are distinct disciplines that operate through different professional lenses, informed by different assumptions and objectives, and should not be conflated.

Community TM Ltd are in a position and can deploy tactics and plans that can assist, with a wider HVM Plan – formulated by specialised advisors – but as a Company, we do not offer HVM as a service.

Neither are we in a position to advise upon the HVM requirements for a specific event. Again, this is a specialised field that we are not directly engaged in and specialised help and guidance should be sought.