The Council are in the final stages of getting Covid Marshals ready to roll out and hope to start from tomorrow. The Covid Marshals will be tasked with being a high visibility presence in East Herts towns, working in conjunction with colleagues from Police and Environmental Health to help ensure that local businesses and the public are complying with covid rules and regulations. They will have no specific powers for enforcement, rather taking an approach of engaging, explaining and encouraging. Where significant concerns arise, these will be reported back to colleagues from Environmental Health and Police to pick up as appropriate

The majority of our Covid Marshals are being brought in from an external agency – HK Security. They will be working in pairs and aim to cover from 10:00 – 16:00 on a Tuesday and Thursday, and 10:00 – 18:00 on a Saturday, initially starting with Bishop’s Stortford, Hertford and Ware. They will review how effective this arrangement is on an ongoing basis and can look to move things around if necessary. In addition to the external Covid Marshals, they also have two East Herts Council staff who will be working Monday – Friday as Covid Marshals. These staff will work alongside colleagues form Environmental Health and predominantly be undertaking the role of observing and reporting

The focus of this work will initially be on town centres, gathering information and intelligence on levels of compliance, with this information shared with colleagues from Environmental Health and Police. Local intelligence in each town will also be helpful in allowing the Covid Marshals to understand areas that might be particularly worthwhile targeting.