With G4S's massive shortfall in security personnel for the Olympics, pound shops up and down the nation have given permission for their security guards to step in and fill the breach.
"They're very good," said Quid Pro Quo owner, Jeremy Stirling. "We've got two hundred stores nationwide and employ two hundred and ten security guards. They need to double up in Nottingham. All of them have been given permission to act as security at the Olympics."
Pound store security guards are among some of the best, and cheapest, security personnel in the country. They can spot the attempted smuggling of any item out of a store from fifty yards, although, generally, they would have to be a lot closer in order to catch the thief. Approximate a yard away. Assuming they don't have a pasty in their hand at the time.
"This is a massive boon," said head of security operations at the Olympics, Sir Sebastian Coe, who has most of the jobs at the Olympics. "No longer will we be the laughing stock of the world due to our inability to find five thousand people willing to work around the clock for a pound an hour. Every other country has managed it, and now we have too."
The back up buses used to transport the Olympic Torch will be sent around the pound shops of the nation collecting the security guards, although those in Nottingham will have to make their own way out of the city and be picked up in Worksop instead, due to perceived security risks to the coaches.
"I'm quite looking forward to it," said Frank Himmler, a security guard for Quid Pro Quo in Derby. "Apparently, any food we confiscate, we can eat. I'm hoping for a few scotch eggs."
