Ask for Angela is a safety initiative where a person asks for a woman called ‘Angela’. However, there is nobody called Angela and instead, this alerts staff that the person asking for her may be in danger and in and uncomfortable situation. For example, you could be on a date and a person starts to make comments or touches you inappropriately.
This helps if you are worried about causing a scene or having people draw attention to you. The assistance you receive might be reuniting you with a friend, seeing you to a taxi, or if it’s a serious safety issue, alerting venue security and if needed, the police.
Across the UK, supermarkets, bars, clubs and other licensed businesses are using the initiative to help people who feel unsafe, vulnerable or threatened. The Metropolitan Police explained that this “code-phrase will indicate to staff that they require help with their situation and a trained member of staff will then look to support and assist them”.
The Met further explained that the phrase was “originally developed by Lincolnshire County Council and adopted by the Met in 2016 as a localised initiative by its police licensing officers. The introduction of WAVE training in 2017 underpinned the delivery of Ask for Angela and more venues began to take on the initiative”.
The code has been in the news after a BBC undercover investigation “found more than half of participating venues failed to respond properly” when it comes to the scheme. The BBC found that a bar employee, whom it called Jack, “worked in three different venues running the scheme from 2018 to 2024. He told the BBC about failures in implementation”.
The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, called the BBC’s findings “shocking and unacceptable” and a government spokesperson said they were “deeply concerning”. Speaking to BBC London, Jack said some venues would initially brief staff about Ask for Angela when putting up posters, however the training was not always told to new employees.
Jack said: “I found that they would put the posters up and things like that, but there wasn’t really any sufficient training on different scenarios that could have happened. Some people weren’t even aware that we were running it, so if someone would ask about Angela, then they wouldn’t really have a clue about what’s going on.”
Because of this, Jack said the lack of consistent training could put vulnerable women at risk explaining: “It could cause an even bigger issue then, if something looks funny. If there’s a perpetrator making a woman feel uncomfortable when she’s spending extended time up at the bar asking staff – it could put her in a more vulnerable position”. You can read the full investigation ‘Ask for Angela: Staff had no clue, says pub worker’ on the BBC News website. You can also find out more through the official Ask for Angela website.