Reasonable force will always be assessed against ALL the prevailing circumstances:

• Was the use of force necessary or could it have been dealt with in another way?
• Were all other available option exhausted first or judged inappropriate or inadequate?

The use of force should always be a choice of last resort.

Criteria on which your actions will be judged:

• Was the action necessary and consistent with your policies/guidelines/care plans?
• Were your actions proportionate to the harm you were trying to prevent?
• Was any force applied used for the minimum length of time?
• Were there any special mitigating circumstances, e.g. the person had attacked you before in similar circumstances, this would justify taking pre-emptive action.