The Effectiveness of the Emergency Planning Arrangements in the United Kingdom - Case Study Example

Title: The effectiveness of the Emergency Planning Arrangements in the United Kingdom Name Institution Date of submission Introduction More than a decade now, the emergency planning arrangement system of the United Kingdom has come across significant reforms since the implementation of Civil Contingency Act 2004. The main objectives of these reforms are to decrease casualties during a disaster occurrence. Analyzing the historical data on disaster management and preparedness, it is clear that there is an increasing frequency and threat of disasters like terrorist incidents, localized emergencies, maritime emergencies and wide-area emergencies in the United Kingdom. After 2005 incidences of terrorist attacks in London, this has raised more concerns about the effectiveness of the UK disaster planning arrangements on the civil emergencies (Civil Contingencies Secretariat 2009a). The Civil Contingency Act 2004 has founded structures and policies to deal with current disaster emergencies in the United Kingdom. Various organizations in the UK have been involved to respond to the civil emergencies both before and after the occurrence of the disasters threats. At the beginning of 21st century, the United Kingdom National Security Strategy (NSS) experienced an increase in civil emergencies in social, economic and environmental sectors. The prevention, response to and recovery from these emergencies can be improved. Looking back to UK history on emergency planning, various organizations involved in emergency planning and management have been reactive. However, the challenges of the 21st century have led to the introduction of pre-emptive regulations that helps in building resilience (Dillon et al., 2009). The introduction of Civil Contingency Act in 2004 brought in a statutory framework of roles and responsibilities among the organizations involved in UK emergency planning arrangements. The Act also established a contemporary framework that uses legislative measures in dealing with the impacts of the most serious emergencies. This is perceived as a positive response by the UK government in remedying civil emergencies that are affecting different sectors of the nation (Cabinet Office, 2012). This paper focuses on the current disaster threats in the United Kingdom and the effectiveness of emergency planning arrangements in addressing these threats. It shows the organization of emergency planning arrangements in the UK by focusing on the roles and responsibilities of the key organizations and pointing out the deficiencies in their management structures. The paper also provides the recommendations to these deficiencies. The major threat affecting the United Kingdom The United Kingdom consists of four countries which include England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. All the three countries are governed from the central capital, London. The natural disasters often experienced in the UK include floods and severe storms due to the frequent rise in sea levels. Apart from natural disasters, accidents, and massive fires have been on an increase recently. Terrorism is currently a major threat to the United Kingdom. Since1980s, United Kingdom, has been a victim of terrorists until 2005 when the concerns were raised regarding the effeteness of emergency planning arrangements of UK (Lee et al., 2012). The table showing national threat level in the United Kingdom Date International terrorism From Northern Ireland-related terrorism Northern Ireland Great Britain 29/8/2014 Sever Sever Moderate 24/10/2012 Substantial Sever Moderate 11/7/2010 Substantial Sever Substantial 24/09/2010 Sever Sever Substantial 22/01/2010 Sever 20/07/2009 Substantial Figure 1. National threat level in the UK United Kingdom Emergency Planning Arrangements The emergency planning arrangements structure in the United Kingdom is decentralized. It is managed at different levels as discussed below. Planning arrangements at the local level Civil Contingency Act 2004 requires the establishment of an integrated framework emergency management. This framework should be relevant to the requirements of the policies and procedures under the Act. The reports from the Cabinet Office (2012) shows that the local authority is the main player during disaster response and recovery in the UK. Local agencies are the first institutions to respond and initiate their roles as far as emergency responses are needed. They work collaboratively with emergency agencies such as police services, ambulance services, and fire and rescue authorities in the event of the emergence of a threat. The police service, under the guidance of Police Gold Commander coordinates the activities at the scene of disasters/emergency. The local level response is the heart of civil protection from the emergencies. It links the category 1 and category 2 organizations. It ensures that category 1 should incorporate category 2 agencies though it is not the main subject of the requirement of the Act. The reforms made allow category 1 and 2 agencies to collaborate in delivering the emergency response. Planning arrangements at the sub-national level The planning arrangements at this level are very important to the civil protection framework. The sub-national level ensures that there is effective coordination of agencies and communication to the central government is controlled. Planning arrangements in the in the devolved administrations The planning arrangements in the devolved administration differ from the planning arrangements for the central government and the local level as well. In Scotland, the emergency planning sits with the Scottish Resilience Division, in Wales, the Local Resilience Forums (LRFs) act as key institutions to ensure the effective collaboration of multi-agency corporations. Unlike in the other three countries, Northern Ireland Office in the United Kingdom government is ensuring that policing in the scene of disaster. At the government level The United Kingdom government is using capability program as the main framework to build resilience in areas affected by disasters. This program seeks to find the deficiencies in the UK emergency planning arrangement system and ensure that the generic capabilities are developed to respond effectively to the emergencies. The main area in this organization is to reduce casualties, respond to biological, chemical or nuclear incidents, provide disaster warning signs and to inform the community. The Strategic Coordination Group (SCG) comprising of senior officials activates emergency organizations to respond appropriately to the emergencies. However, in some situations, the central government of the United Kingdom though the Lead Government Department initiates the response in case of such instances as terrorism. The Cabinet Office Briefing Room (COBR) is activated to ensure that there is effective coordination (Cabinet Office, 2012). The volunteering sector emergency planning arrangements In some circumstances such as terrorism, the civil emergencies may overstretch the resources on local government and national government. Under the regulations guided by the CCA 2004, the generic framework in the United Kingdom incorporates the voluntary sector at every level of emergency planning arrangement (Cabinet Office, 2013). Since they link the community with the category 1 agencies, this will enable them to offer support in the development of community resilient activities. The volunteering sector provides a variety of support such as practical support (first aid or transportation), psycho-social support (counseling), medical equipment and information services (communication). The potential conflict to disaster resolution in the United Kingdom With the existing decentralized responsibilities in the United Kingdom, the emergency planning arrangements have a potential conflict when it comes to responding to an emergency. The clear issues that lead to possible conflict include overlap, duplication and omission of roles and responsibilities in logistical operations. In practical, the duplication and overlapping of responsibilities rarely occurs in the United Kingdom emergency planning arrangements since the lead governments are fully integrated into the Strategic Coordinating Group (SCG), and are conversant with the arrangements (Cabinet Office 2012). Based on evidence-based practice, the research by Lee et al. (2012) found that the inconsistency of UK emergency planning arrangements at different levels is a result of dependence on the organizational culture of the agencies. As a result, one culture may be believed to be more efficient that the other especially when there is the overlapping of roles. For example, the Lead Government under the guidance of Civil Contingency Act 2004 may initiate the response towards terrorism attack. Both the fire and rescue authorities and police services may appear on the scene of which it may lead to a conflict of ideas on how to secure the scene. How the UK emergency planning arrangements acts in the event of a disaster Figure 2 Key OGC – Open Geospatial Consortium TCG – Theatre Communication Group SCG - Strategic Coordination Group When there is an emergency, the OGC agencies inform the TCG agencies who will ensure that the information regarding the disaster is dispatched to the appropriate agencies. Identified deficiencies from the United Kingdom emergency planning arrangements The following are the deficiencies identified from the emergency planning arrangements in the United Kingdom. These various responsible structures in the UK have been regarded as serious deficiencies that affect their performance as far as emergency response and preparedness is concerned. They include: 1. Though the Civil Contingency Act 2004 has defined the direction of roles and responsibilities of various agencies, Strategic Coordination Group (SCG) have not defined the roles of multi-agency collaboration in the on-site. Though there are a universal on-site emergency plans for various disasters in the United Kingdom, sometimes the disasters may go beyond the emergency preparedness and response thresholds thus calling for extra support from other agencies. Sometimes during this situation there may arise a conflict of ideas. 2. Sometimes terrorism attacks are severe, and the emergency agencies lack sufficient staff and other resources. The unavailability of enough staff at the time of disaster increases the number of casualties. The allocation of resources from the United Kingdom is based on the severity of the threats. Sometimes the resources allocated may not be enough to cater for the emergency response plans. 3. Lack of training of employees. The regulations guiding the institutions managing emergencies in the United Kingdom are regularly training employees on the new skills and capabilities of the new advances. However, some institutions have failed to train employees on how to protect important data/information not to be used by unauthorized users. Cybercrime is increasing, and terrorists are hacking into the systems of organizations like police service. Despite the integration of emergency management plans in the UK Cyber Security Frameworks, the system may not be in a good position to effectively manage the current threats of terrorism due to lack of ‘Cyber defenders.’ There are still research placements to train and develop effective cyber defenders. 4. Some of the organizations at the local level do not have defined regulations for the examination, testing and inspection period of the emergency plans. The migratory provisions, especially on the chemical and radiology emergency plans, are less effective despite the advance in technology. 5. The decentralization of the emergency planning arrangements often fails to supply the information in time that is essential for drawing up an off-site emergency plan. The Strategic Coordination Centre (SCC) is expected to coordinate all the agencies in an emergence of a disaster. However, based on the time and scale of the emergencies, some of the agencies may take a lead thus failing to execute a comprehensive response towards an emergency. 6. There is no effective collaboration among the agencies involved from the national level to the local level. Despite Civil Contingency Policy Branch discharging the Central Operation Rooms (COR) functions, the link between the agencies has not been very efficient especially in responding to terrorism threat in the United Kingdom. For example, the media liaison point can be affected by the late arrival of the police services at the site. Media is an important agency that will inform other organizations to arrive in time. Recommendations for improvements to the emergency planning arrangements Recommendation 1 The basic principle of the Strategic Coordination Group in the local agencies response is to develop effective emergency planning arrangements with clear roles between all the levels involves. Therefore, the more focus should be put on the ‘objects’ of regulation and how these objects can be used to define the roles of every agency at the on-site. Recommendation 2 This also goes to the issue of on-site responsibilities (Deficiency 1). Reforms should be made to enable vocal guidelines during the emergency planning response, from the Strategic Coordination Group (SCG) to the Lead Government Department (LGD). The formalized record containing defined responsibilities should be drafted and commissioned to appropriate agencies at all levels. Recommendation 3 Regarding deficiency number 2, the United Kingdom government should evaluate the number of workers needed for emergency response in all agencies. Organizational audits should be done to know whether these organizations have the right number of workers with enough resources as well. In a situation where an organization has few workers, it should employ the recommended as per the requirements of the agency regulations. Recommendation 4 Regarding deficiency 3, the Civil Contingency Act 2004 should be further strengthening with the key elements involving training employees in security issues. The training should focus on the management of data (data collection, storing and dissemination)). The Lead Government Department should nominate four members from every level and region. The members are updated on the new methods of cyber security. Also, every agency should ensure that there is a ‘cyber defender’ that protects the systems of agencies from being invaded by terrorists and hackers. Recommendation 5 Local and national level emergencies should utilize the current guidelines of the Civil Contingency Act 2004 to develop pre-emptive declarations on the serious emergency threats like terrorism. These declarations should be made proactively by the United Kingdom national government. The Civil Contingencies Secretariat should ensure that all the levels are informed to actively participate in the emergency planning developments. Also, the Civil Contingency Act 2004 should be amended to provide police more powers to handle the intensity of the terror threats as well as the public. Recommendation 6 The Strategic Coordination Group (SCG) should develop a genuine partnership framework that incorporates all levels involved in emergency planning arrangements. This framework should place emphasis on the use of national disaster arrangements under the new reforms and use Cabinet Office Briefing to ensure effective consultation with the agencies. Also, there is a need to revise national governance arrangements to achieve continuous improvement in the emergency planning arrangements. Conclusion Many reviewers can confirm that United Kingdom emergency planning arrangements, based on the arrangements at national, regional and local level, performs fairly well in most cases. The whole system is knowable about the current threats facing the United Kingdom especially the terrorism. Despite this kind of performance, however, there is a need for improvement in some cases for particular emergency threats. Natural disasters are not that prone currently in the United Kingdom. Threats from chemical, social, radiology and terrorism are more severe in the United Kingdom. The decentralized system of emergency planning arrangements will continue to face more challenges unless the deficiencies are addressed. Some of the deficiencies found to be severely affecting the disaster arrangements in the UK are the lack of employees, lack of appropriate, lack of ‘cyber defenders’, and poor partnership between the agencies at all levels. The United Kingdom has to invest more in training, cyber security, building a cooperative culture and making reforms to suit the changing demands of disasters to improve the efficiency of these arrangements. The Central government and the local government should allow reforms on Civil Contingency Act 2004 to establish a defined direction of roles of various agencies. With a reformed emergency planning arrangement structures, the future of the UK’s disaster management and the response is certain that it is in a position to manage and reduce the impact of disasters. References Cabinet Office, (2012). Revision to Emergency Preparedness. Reference to the sections of the Civil Contingency Act 2004. Cabinet Office, (2013). Responding to an emergency: arrangements in England. United Kingdom. Civil Contingencies Secretariat. (2009a, March 26). The Lead Government Department and its role – Guidance and Best Practice. Retrieved April 10, 2009, from Cabinet Office: http://www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/media/132844/lgds.pdf Department of Health, (2005). Taking healthcare to the patient. London: Communication for the department of health. Dillon, B., Dickinson, I., Whiteford, F. and Williamson, J. (2009). Emergency planning officers' handbook. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Lee, A., Phillips, W., Challen, K. and Goodacre, S. (2012). Emergency management in health: key issues and challenges in the UK. BMC Public Health, 12(1), p.884. Pollock, K. (2013). Emergency planning college occupation papers: review of persistent lessons identified relating to interoperability from emergencies and major incidents since 1986. A report commissioned by the cabinet office Civil Contingencies Secretary.. London. Read More