The lessons of 7/7

Topics: emergency planning, communications

If you live in the UK, or even if you live elsewhere, I bet you can remember where you were when you heard the news of the atrocious attacks on the London transport system in July of last year.

I was in London that day, but thankfully I was no more affected than the emotional shock and having a really hard time getting home.

The lessons of what went well and what could have been better in the response from public services have been published in a report. Overall, public servants performed as we would have expected, admirably. From the tube drivers and other London Underground staff, the emergency services, the doctors and nurses and other health care professionals - they worked hard and saved lives.

But some things didn't go so well, and a lot of these were less to do with individuals on the day than with the systems that supported them.

The London Resiliance Partnership was set up immediately after the terror attacks in the US on September 11, 2001. Its members are taken from London and central government, the emergency services, the business and voluntary sectors and the military - and its role is to ensure preparedness for major catastrophic events. The Minister for Local Government, Phil Woolas, issued a statement on behalf of the partnership in response to the report:

There were some incredible acts of bravery and everybody on duty from the emergency services, transport staff, health, local authorities, voluntary agency staff and Londoners stepped up and delivered their best on what was far all a day of unspeakable tragedy. There can be no doubt that lives were saved thanks to the efforts of everyone involved in the response.

The sheer scale and unique nature of events on 7 July mean that naturally there will be lessons to learn about our response. Some issues have already been recognised and acted upon, such as communications systems and problems with radios underground. Any useful contribution to ensuring that London is as well prepared as possible to deal with future emergencies is welcome.

Indeed communications between and within individual services (such as Transport for London or the Ambulance Services) were criticised. The Guardian has an article outlining some of the issues.

Not all partnerships are set up to deal with calamitous events, but the partners of any Local Strategic Partnership would have to work together if the worst happened in your area. How would they communicate? How could they communicate?

Even with less tragic events, communications can break down easily. What have your partnerships done to ensure that people who need to talk to each other do?

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