Last night’s chaos outside a Manchester hotel, where fans smashed glass doors in a desperate rush to glimpse the lead actor of the hit show *Pursuit of Jade*, has reignited a bitter row about the cost of safety in Britain’s entertainment industry. For the security guards who earn minimum wage to hold the line, the incident is not a one-off spectacle but a symptom of a broken system.
Footage from the scene shows a surge of hundreds of teenagers pressing against the hotel’s entrance, their phones raised, as the glass finally gave way. No one was seriously injured, but the repair bill is expected to run into thousands. More importantly, the psychological toll on the security staff – most of whom are agency workers on zero-hours contracts – is immense.
“This is happening every week somewhere,” said Marcus Doyle, a steward from Manchester who has worked fan events for ten years. “We get the blame when barriers go down, but we’re not trained for a human tsunami. The companies don’t want to pay for crowd management consultants or metal barriers. They just throw bodies at the problem.”
Doyle earns £10.42 an hour, barely above the real living wage. After transport and uniform costs, he takes home around £340 for a 40-hour week. Meanwhile, the cost of a single ticket to an event with the *Pursuit of Jade* star often exceeds £100. The disconnect between the glamour on stage and the grime behind the scenes is stark.
In response to the incident, the British Security Industry Association (BSIA) has called for a mandatory licensing scheme for crowd controllers and a minimum ratio of trained staff to attendees at high-risk events. Their proposal includes a requirement for risk assessments to be filed 72 hours in advance and for all venues to install crash-rated barriers. “The current model relies on cheap, casual labour,” said a BSIA spokesperson. “We need a professional, properly remunerated workforce. Anything less is a danger to the public and to the workers themselves.”
But critics argue that these reforms will simply be passed on to fans through higher ticket prices or to workers through more inefficient shifts. The Union for Security Professionals, which represents 5,000 stewards, estimates that enforcing the proposed standards would add at least £2 per hour to wages. “That’s not enough to live on, but it’s a start,” said union secretary Paula Grant. “We want a living wage and guaranteed hours. Crowd control is not a side hustle. It is a life-and-death responsibility.”
The incident has also drawn attention to the wider phenomenon of celebrity-fuelled hysteria. The actor at the centre of the frenzy, whose name has been withheld for security reasons, issued a statement pleading with fans to “stay safe”. But the structural problems remain. With the show’s final season airing next year, demand is only expected to intensify.
In the meantime, the hotel’s management has installed temporary plywood barriers and doubled the security presence. But for workers like Doyle, the question remains: who will pay for the real changes needed? “I don’t want to be a martyr for a TV show,” he said. “I just want to go home in one piece.”
