Emergency Planning
- What is Emergency Planning?
- How are Risks Identified?
- Planning for Risks
- Partnership Working and Sharing Information
- Training and Exercising
- Business Continuity
- Further Information
What is Emergency Planning?
Emergencies can occur anywhere at any time – often with little or no warning. Emergencies are events that pose an immediate risk to life, health, property or the environment. They can be caused by a number of factors including man-made incidents such as road traffic accidents, or secondary effects from naturally occurring events such as extreme weather.
Emergency Planning is the process of identifying these risks and implementing measures to reduce the chance of the emergency taking place. If it's impossible to remove a risk, plans are made to reduce the impact that the risk could have on people and the environment, if it was to cause an emergency.
The Emergency Planning Process
Assess 
Plan Train Exercise Review Repeat
How are Risks Identified?
To understand what hazards pose potential risks to the borough, the Emergency Planning team participates in a joint risk assessment.
Haringey Borough Risk Register aligns with the GLA's risk assessment process.
Planning for Risks
The Emergency Planning team writes plans to map how the council will respond to emergencies. These plans are consistently reviewed and maintained to ensure they are up to date. The following are generic plans which are likely to be used by Haringey Council in any emergency.
- Emergency Management Plan is a generic plan that outlines how the council will respond to a major incident. The Emergency Management Plan details actions for different departments and agencies according to the stage of the emergency.
- Warning, Informing and Alerting Plan details the procedures for sharing information internally, to partners and to the public in an emergency. It is a 'protocol' that refers to a set of standing procedures that will be utilised in the relevant circumstance. The protocol primarily covers the warning period before an incident, and the response and recovery phase afterwards.
- Emergency Welfare Plan outlines how the council and partner agencies will coordinate their response to protect the welfare of people affected by an emergency. The Emergency welfare plan is a capability plan that details how the council will assess:
- the impact on the health and welfare of the population
- the process of identifying vulnerable people
- the provision of temporary accommodation/shelter for residents made homeless or those who are required to evacuate their homes
- and the services available to provide practical and emotional support to those affected
Other Plans
The above plans are referred to as 'Capability plans'. This type of plan covers how particular responses will be carried out.
The Emergency Planning team also maintains a number of other plans which may be used to respond to emergencies. These include; 'Hazard-specific' plans which provide response details for particular kinds of emergency events, eg: pandemic influenza plan, structural collapse.
Partnership Working and Sharing Information
Partnership working is essential in emergency planning and response. The London Resilience Partnership is made up of more than 170 organisations. This is to ensure that in the event of a major incident that affects multiple areas in London, organisations are able to work effectively together to respond to the incident and minimise any impacts.
As part of the London Resilience Partnership, Haringey Council attends a variety of forums to facilitate information sharing and cooperation with partner agencies locally, regionally and nationally.
These forums include:
- Haringey Resilience Forum (HRF) - this borough-based forum allows for local partners to share information, practices, training and workstreams to prepare the borough
- North Central Emergency Planning Officer (NC EPO) Forum - this is a regional forum where the Emergency Planning teams of Haringey, Enfield, Camden, Islington, Hackney and Barnet discuss regional issues as well as sharing information on incidents, training and allows joined working on projects
- Multi-Faith Forum - this borough-based forum allows for local faith leaders to come together, share information and work closely with the council
- Tension Forum- this borough-based forum allows local partners to feedback any identified tensions within the borough to a strategic level, to help inform the work that is being done in the borough
Training and Exercising
Training and exercising is an essential part of the emergency planning process which ensures all staff involved in emergency planning and response are able to manage any type of incident to the best of their ability.
Training aims to raise the awareness of staff that have a role in emergency planning and response. It aids the improvement of staffs skills set and competencies in relation to their emergency management responsibilities.
This also helps develop an understanding of how their role fits into the wider picture.
Exercises provide a working environment to test emergency management plans and roles. Exercises will often follow training modules to ensure staff have the grounding knowledge to test the procedures as appropriate.
Business Continuity
Business Continuity is closely related to emergency planning. Its core aim is to ensure essential services are maintained during, and in the aftermath of an emergency.
For more information on Business Continuity and advice on how to implement it in your own workplace, please see the Business Continuity page.
Further information
For further information on emergency planning and business continuity, please contact:
Haringey Emergency Planning & Business Continuity Team
4th Floor North, River Park House
225 High Road
Wood Green,
London
N22 8HQ
Tel 020 8489 3334 (outside office hours: 020 8489 0000)
Email emergencyplanning@haringey.gov.uk