PPSS Group Is Moving To A New Office!

Posted on 08/02/2012 by Robert Kaiser

Please allow me to genuinely thank everyone for their support over the past few years.  Without you our success would have been impossible.

I think it is fair to say that everyone at PPSS Group has done their absolutely utmost.  They all have worked hard to ensure customer satisfaction.

It is also without question that we have developed into a company, which is now almost renowned for exceptional product quality.

We constantly aim to design, develop, manufacture and supply bullet proof vests, stab vests and cut resistant clothing, which we 100% believe in.

Our video demonstrations have been produced to highlight our limitless faith in our work.  We absolutely believe that we do is right and good.

Thanks, once again to everyone… with your help we have outgrown our existing facility.

In order to ensure a continuing smooth operation and in order to create space for further potentially life saving product developments, we will move to our new Headquarters on Monday, 5th March 2012

NEW LOCATION:   Unit 1 Whitfield Business Park, Manse Lane, Knaresborough, North Yorkshire, HG5 8LF

Robert

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ex Special Forces Rob Stirling introducing PPSS Body Armour

Posted on 30/01/2012 by Robert Kaiser

Robert Stirling is a widely renowned military expert and consultant, having joined the British SAS at a very young age and then having served with the Rhodesian Army and South African Special Forces.

In this video Rob is kindly introducing PPSS Body Armour and its range of high performance bullet proof vests.

Rob’s expert opinion and guidance is respected and appreciated all over the world.

Today Robert acts as a consultant and trainer for several governments, some private companies and the European Military Parachutist Association based in Germany. He has written several non-fiction books and he is heavily involved in charity work for soldiers and veterans.

A video in which Robert Kaiser, CEO of PPSS Body Armour is being shot from close range by a Glock 19 (9x19mm FMJ 124gr) can be viewed here:

 

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Australian Prime Minister’s security threat highlights need for concealable body armour for political leaders and dignitaries

Posted on 27/01/2012 by Robert Kaiser

Julia Gillard, Australia’s political leader found herself in an extremely dangerous situation when attending a function this week.

About 100 – 200 protesters began banging on the glass sides of the building and yelled “shame” and “racist”.  The protest lasted 20 minutes until about 50 police dragged the two to safety.

A body guard and a number of security and law enforcement officers dragged her into safety.

Ms Gillard appeared of course shaken as she was rushed out of the restaurant where she was celebrating an Australian day of importance.

This incident proofs once again that ultra light and 100% concealable bullet proof vests have a place within the personal security and personal protection of political, religious and cultural leaders, dignitaries and other high profile professionals.

Many of these professional must, or feel the need, to appear confident, without fear and as a true leader all their followers can depend on.  This is often the reason why overt body armour are often seen as a proper ‘no go’.  They might even think that this is exactly what they pay good money for… so executive and diplomatic professionals take care of this responsibility.

There is no doubt that a good protection team is able to drastically reduce the risk of fatal or non-fatal attacks on their clients.  The gathering of intelligence, their evaluation, the pre driving of routes and pre visiting of venue, will all help to improve the personal safety of the dignitary.

The above incident however highlights that even events, risk assessments concluded as ‘low risk’ can often escalate by a number of unforeseen circumstances.  This is where concealable body armour can be of a great advantage.  Such piece of equipment is never the only reliable solution to a security threat… but certainly an additional safety net many political leaders or other high profile professionals should take advantage off.

PPSS Group is a UK based company, specialised in the design, development and manufacturing of high performance covert body armour.

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Council staff punched, kicked and bitten as they do their jobs

Posted on 18/01/2012 by Robert Kaiser

Preventing the abuse and attacks on local authority workers and subsequent injuries is now a priority issue for many local governments. Work-related violence is a contributing factor to stress and absenteeism among staff costing UK employers £700 million annually.

The truly outrageous range of physical attacks on traffic warden, licensing and trading standards and housing enforcement officers, as well as social workers have been revealed in a number data released by local authorities.

Statistics released under the Freedom of Information Act reveal incidents of staff being punched, bitten, head-butted, attacked with pool cues and even suffering sexual abuse.

Recent headlines within the last three months:

We must admit all this data and all these statistics and news of incidents are a stark reminder of the dangers faced by many council workers as they go about their work – often on relatively low levels of pay.

We will also agree that all of our public servants should feel safe to carry out their important work without the threat of physical and verbal abuse.

It’s important to stress that some reported incidents, especially those involving care staff, are related to the medical conditions of people receiving a service… but nevertheless protection for these frontline professionals is something that needs looking at.

Who’s at risk?

  • Community Care Workers – Working with vulnerable groups in disadvantaged areas increases risk of violence.
  • Environmental Officers – Enforcing regulations and to police the systems places officers at risk from violence as well as accidents at work.
  • Trading Standard Officers – Visiting car boot sales and assisting police during raids can be a high risk job at times.
  • Licensing Enforcement Officers – Visiting nightclubs, taxi ranks, take aways and other late night venue puts them in contact with intoxicate and sometimes hostile members of the public.
  • Housing Officers – Verbal and physical attacks from tenants, when discussing issues such as ‘rent areas’
  • Probation Officers – At a high risk of violence due to the nature of this work.
  • Social Workers – Staff are often required to work at all hours, including late at night often in deprived areas increasing risk of violence.
  • Specialist Teaching staff – Dealing with behavioural problems and special needs, severe learning disabilities and challenging behaviour can represent realistic dangers.
  • Traffic Wardens – At a high risk of verbal and physical attack from angry drivers.

UK based PPSS Group are dedicated to designing, developing and manufacturing of bullet proof vests, stab vests and cut resistant clothing, in order to protect these domestic frontline professionals.

I am not saying everyone working for a local council is at risk of getting stabbed, of course not.  However I feel strongly that these professionals have the right to be equipped appropriately and that they deserve the best.

For some council worker stab vests might well be ‘overkill’, this is why blunt trauma vests and cut resistant clothing has been developed.

Blunt trauma vests protect council worker from blunt forced trauma injuries following a kick, punch or any sort of impact by a blunt object.

Cut resistant clothing offers excellent protection from slashes, often the result of a knife attack or an attack using some sort of edged weapon.

Please note PPSS Group is also the organiser of the annual LONE WORKER SAFETY Conference & Exhibition, taking place on Tue 27th November 2012 @ Olympia Conference Centre.

If you feel we can help please call me or PPSS Group.

Call 0845 5193 953 or email info@ppss-group.com

 

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Update: LONE WORKER SAFETY 2012 Conference & Exhibition

Posted on 09/01/2012 by Robert Kaiser

We are now in the process of preparing our LONE WORKER SAFETY 2012 event to provide like minded professionals involved in lone worker safety with specific and up-to-date information, which will go far beyond theory alone.

The LONE WORKER SAFETY 2012 Conference & Exhibition will take place on Tue 27th November 2012 @ the Olympia Conference Centre, London, UK.

This great event will be once again be structured around lone worker safety and focus on health & safety professionals, lone workers themselves, managers, team leaders and senior members of staff who work within organisations where lone working takes place.

If lone worker protection is something you are passionate about then this is the event to attend.

Any questions?

Please call us on 0845 5193 953 or email info@loneworkersafetyexpo.com

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‘Front Only Body Armour’ to offer blunt force trauma protection for female mental health care professionals

Posted on 15/12/2011 by Robert Kaiser

A while ago we have launched our front only body armour, in an attempt to reduce workplace violence related injuries within mental health care sectors, and those working within severe learning disabilities, challenging behaviour, autism and special needs.

The single front plate is made out of a ultra tough and extremely light body moulded 3mm polycarbonate plate, and held against the upper body via 6 point adjustable elastic straps.

A number of mental health care facilities have recently asked us to supply something that protects very specific areas, such as the female breasts, which have often been subject to very violent grabs or nips. This type of front only body armour is ideal for those professionals, offering unmatched protection from human bites, punches, kicks and blows of blunt objects, often occurring in the above sectors.

This really innovative new body armour also offers 16 Joule of stab protection and unmatched protection from hypodermic needles.

We are fully aware of the fact that there has been a serious lack of personal protective equipment and body armour availably specifically to females. This new type of body armour is ideal for female mental health care professionals.

Are you aware that it took more than 25 years from the initial launch of body armour to the police forces here in the UK to the first major developments of female specific body armour?

For us it has always been and will always be crucial to listen to our potential customers and find out what they have to say. Then it is our job to design and manufacture PPE based on their operational risks and duties.  This is exactly what happened prior to the development of our bite resistant clothing.

The new front only body armour is available as a female version or male and can be purchased directly from UK based PPSS Group or one of our international distributors..

In case you have any question in regards to our protective equipment and protective clothing… please visit www.ppss-group.com or email info@ppss-group.com or call  +44 (0) 845 5193 953

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How Bite Resistant Clothing Will Help Protect Mental Health Care Professionals?

Posted on 02/12/2011 by Robert Kaiser

Professionals working in mental health care hospitals or similar facilities specialised in severe learning disabilities, challenging behaviour, special needs or autism, will know that human bites are relatively frequent in their work environment.

Bite-related injuries can then of course become infected and mental health care professionals could subsequently be contaminated with pathogens. Transmissions of potentially life threatening viruses, such as Hepatitis B, Hepatitis C or HIV are also a part of reality.

According to data released by the UK’s NHS Security Management Service, mental health care professionals are far more likely to be attacked than other health care workers with a total of 38,958 assaults in 2008-09, accounting for 71% of attacks on health care staff during that period. However, the percentage of which involved human bites is unknown.

“More than half of nurses on mental health wards have been physically attacked”, the joint Healthcare Commission and Royal College of Psychiatrists report here in the UK states. This audit covered eight in 10 of the organisations providing in-patient care for the 30,000 mental health patients in England and Wales.

In 2010 the BBC published a statement of the deputy director of the Royal College of Nursing, saying that “attacks on staff working in mental health are increasing in Northern Ireland”.

Looking at the potential and realistic consequences, especially following a human bite, we must look at all possible options in order to help protect mental health care professionals from such consequences, which in the worst case scenario can include death.

Bite resistant clothing can make a difference

The use of bite resistant clothing has recently become an extremely efficient approach to improve the individual safety of mental health care workers, drastically reducing the danger of infections.

Debbie Townsend, Physical Intervention Training Manager of the Oxfordshire Learning Disability NHS Trust (Ridgeway Partnership).says: “Bites can cause both physical injury, risk of infection, soft tissue damage and psychological distress to staff. Whilst our staff teams are usually aware of the potential for bites from records of previous incidents and preventative steps are taken, additional measure to protect staff from a bite may be beneficial.”

I suggest we can say that bite resistant clothing is clearly ‘beneficial’.

Especially bite resistant sleeves, arm guards or bite resistant sweatshirts have lately been issued to a number of mental health care specialists in countries around the world.  Our normal instinctive response when faced by a possible hostile or attacking individual is to lift our arms and hands in order to defend ourselves and protect our head and facial area.  This subsequently exposes our forearm and hands to a lot higher danger of injuries.

In fact the majority of injuries found on police or security specialists can be found on their forearms or hands.  These injuries are classed as defensive injuries.  Bite resistant sleeves will significantly decrease the risk of bite injuries on arms and hands, and subsequently reduce the risk of infections and cross contamination.

Bite resistant garments made out of the recently developed Cut-Tex® PRO high performance fabric can comfortably be worn under or on top of existing items of clothing or uniform.

However, it is worth pointing out that bite resistant clothing only reduces the danger of human teeth penetrating the other person’s skin… but will not quit the potentially painful impact due to the pressure and force of the human jaw. So the danger of infection will be eliminated, but the danger of bruising remains.

Based on the many conversations I had recently I can certainly confirm the main worry within this sector seems to be the risk of infection, and not the risk of severe bruising.

PPSS is the global leader of bite resistant clothing, having also developed bite resistant sleeves or arm guards with additional build in padding to effectively reduce the severity of bruising following a human bite.

PPSS bite resistant clothing and other protective clothing is available in a number of countries including most European countries, the US and Australasia.

If you want to speak with me or my team about bite resistant clothing and how it potentially can help you within your line of work… please call +44 (0) 845 5193 953 or email info@ppss-group.com

 

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Helping to Protect Taxi Drivers from Knife Attacks

Posted on 23/11/2011 by Robert Kaiser

Following a number of violent knife attacks on taxi drivers, PPSS Group have now launched cut and slash resistant clothing to help protect them.

I genuinely believe that our high performance cut resistant clothing will help protect taxi drivers, who often work alone at night, dealing with potentially hostile and intoxicated members of the public.

The safety of the taxi drivers has to be paramount, as their job takes them to so many places that can be remote, very dangerous and often without any mobile/cell phone reception. The great variety of people they have in their vehicles represent another obvious, realistic and serious threat to the driver.

Racial harassment and aggressive complains about the fare and serious drunken disorder are all issues taxi drivers have to face, often on a daily basis… especially at the end of weekend nights when customers have been drinking excessively all night.

Just read the following international news for yourself:

Although excellent personal safety advice for taxi drivers is available on the internet, it is however often not enough to protect these frontline professionals.

Several taxi and private hire firms have now invested in a number of tools, in order to help improve the personal safety of their employees.  Especially CCTV systems have become a valuable device to combat aggressive incidents, sending a clear signal to the passenger they will be filmed, they will be prosecuted and the video footage will be used as physical evidence in a court of law.

However, we have to admit that such ‘preventative technology’ will not do the trick every time, as some aggressive members of the public either don’t care about the potential repercussion following an assault or they are simply so intoxicated they just don’t get it any more.

This is why we need an additional ‘safety net’.  Something that protects us if all the CCTV systems in the world and all the best communication skills and our great personality have failed to stop such attack.

Smart looking and comfortable cut and slash resistant windbreaker, sweat shirts, sleeves and gloves can act as such ‘safety net’ and are ideal for taxi drivers and private hire as they 100% concealable.

We need to understand, that a knife attack, which sees the radial artery, the carotid artery or the axillary artery being cut or slashed will under normal circumstances lead to a rapid blood loss and can subsequently cause death within a very few minutes.

I can only encourage taxi drivers to contact us in case they wish to discuss the subject of personal protective clothing.

Our email is info@ppss-group.com the number is +44 (0) 845 5193 953 and our website is www.ppss-group.com 

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Prison Officers in Need for Concealable Body Armour

Posted on 18/11/2011 by Robert Kaiser

Have you heard of that TRIPLE murderer has been cleared of stabbing three North-East prison officers after he claimed to suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) caused by his previous prison experiences?

What is going on?  Well, what is going wrong?

Dave Thompson, who retired as Frankland Governor last month and was in charge when the incident happened, said: “Staff at Frankland and elsewhere across the service will feel let down, dismayed and humiliated by part of the criminal justice system in which they serve.”

Claire Lewis, Craig Wylde, and Neil Walker are the three officers who have suffered horrendous attacks during this crazy incident this year, and there is no doubt they are truly heart broken understanding that justice has not been done.

I have spoken to Claire Wylde, one of the assaulted officers, and I could truly sense the psychological pain she is currently has to deal with.  ’Justice being done’ would 100% have helped her recovery process.

Well, as much as we would like to, we are of course aware that we cannot change the aggressive behaviour of some prisoners. There is simply no doubt that a prisoner consuming drugs, illegal substances or self made alcohol can become hostile and violent within a split of a second, regardless of the prison officers excellent communication skill and calm personality.

The question we should ask ourselves is:  What will we do in order to protect these frontline professionals?

It is rather interesting that police officers who deal with a criminal individual for only a very few minutes during the arrest procedure is by law required to wear protective equipment… but the professional charged with supervising the same individual potentially for a number of years is not been issued with any type of protective clothing at all?

It is just beyond belief that 81% of prisons in the UK have PlayStations listed as one of the facilities available for prisoners; however prison officers dealing with these potentially hostile individuals on a daily basis potentially for many years to come, have got no access to stab vests or cut resistant clothing using Cut-Tex®PRO cut resistant fabric.  Do we really expect criminals to ‘calm down’ following their arrest?  Do we expect them to learn what respect and manners are all about within days or week of their imprisonment?

For me it is simply common sense that prison officers should be protected from kicks, blows and punches as well as needles and razor blades.  Prisoners do kick, they punch, they have access to hypodermic needles and can make improvised edged weapons very quickly. It is not very difficult at all… again… regardless of how thorough and good the prison officers might be.

Please sign this importantUK Government petition ‘Stab Proof Vests for Prison Officers‘!

I am very pleased that recent changes within the law such as the Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Act 2007 are already putting a healthy level of pressure on key decision makers within the UK’s prison sector.

If prison officers are not permitted to purchase stab vests or body protection or if certain governments are not taking all necessary actions to ensure the personal safety of their prison officers, we will be looking at more and more injuries, and one day one of these officers will not come home.  Why not?  Because for one silly reason or another we have not done our job properly and not protected those who serve and protect in the way they certainly deserve. What ever the reason or excuse will be… for me… this is not acceptable.

It is a legal, but above all, a moral obligation.  We have to protect those who serve, care and risk their lives every day they go to work.  Concealable body armour will of course not eliminate the risk of injury within the prison environment, but they certainly improve the chance of prison officer coming home safely at the end of the working day.

Having spoken to a retired Control & Restrain Instructor of the National Tactical Response Group, I am aware that they have also advised all prison services that if they could afford to buy trauma or stab vests then they should. This however was predominantly for staff trained in advanced tactics for major disturbances.

For me it is very easy to explain.  Body armour are just like seat belts in a car… they are not a guarantee for surviving accidents… but they are a great additional safety net, increasing your chances of survival.

I hope I have defeated the argument of those who are opposed to body armour saying they look too confrontational, aggressive or authoritative in my previous blogs/articles.  Put this pressure on the body armour manufacturer… there are many many designs available, enabling the wearer the present themselves as peaceful ambassador within their line of work.

Speak to us:  +44 (0) 845 5193 953 or visit www.ppss-group.com

My genuine thoughts are with these prison officers, who walked out of that court room this week, shaking their heads… hoping that one day their colleagues will benefit form the body protection that can easily be made available to them.

I hope your thoughts are with them too.

Robert

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LONE WORKER SAFETY 2012 Conference & Exhibition

Posted on 10/11/2011 by Robert Kaiser

Please allow  me to use my blog to thank everyone for making the LONE WORKER SAFETY events such a great success.

I am indeed very proud of the overwhelming comments received over the past years, and as you can see we are now in the process of preparing our LONE WORKER SAFETY 2012 event to provide like minded professionals involved in lone worker safety with specific and up-to-date information, which will go far beyond theory alone.

Our LONE WORKER SAFETY 2012 will be structured around lone worker safety and focus on health & safety professionals, lone workers themselves, managers, team leaders and senior members of staff who work within organisations where lone working takes place, and if lone worker protection is something you are passionate about then this is the event to attend.

Have a great day everyone.

Robert

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