Emergency Planning

Lord Kamall Excerpts

Monday 20th February 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)]

DLUHC is working with the local resilience forums to work out what we should be doing in the light of the latest developments. I agree that the focus on the website is not always great, particularly when websites go down during emergencies, which has been my own experience. I have dealt locally with people who deal with emergencies, notably on Covid. The voluntary effort that comes forth when emergencies take place and all the good things that are done are really impressive. We have to learn from that and put that into the system, as it were, for the future. I take the point about making sure that people know, by leaflets and so on as well as by websites, what they need to do in the case of an emergency.

[Lord Kamall (Con)]

The noble Lord opposite talked about the website for resilience. For the benefit of noble Lords who are not yet aware of this website, can my noble friend the Minister share the URL for that website so that we can evangelise about it on her behalf?

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)]

I will certainly take forward my noble friend’s idea. I have also been impressed by the system that the mobile phone operators have that you can ring if your electricity goes down. These things exist, but the point—as expressed so powerfully on the other Benches—is that we need to make sure that people know what to do when flooding comes or there are other local difficulties. That is why we have put in a new head of resilience within the Cabinet Office and have published the risk framework. We are open to new ideas, both on substance and on communication, as I hope that I have shown.