CLEVELAND EMERGENCY PLANNING UNIT

The Unit provides an emergency planning service to the four local authorities in the former Cleveland area. Our role is to ensure the local authorities are prepared to respond to emergencies and to support the emergency services and the community. To this end we maintain and test the Major Incident Plan for each authority. Contingency plans are prepared for a range of hazards in our community including large scale events, industrial accidents and flooding in cooperation with organisations such as businesses, the Environment Agency, volunteer groups and the emergency services.

The Unit also incorporates the Emergency Planning Officers from Cleveland Police, Cleveland Fire Brigade and the North East Ambulance Service making it a unique arrangement. This approach ensures strong partnership working with excellent co-operation and sharing of information. The primary aims of emergency planning are: To provide a comprehensive and effective resilience and emergency planning service to the four local authorities; To achieve an effective response to all major incidents and emergency situations regardless of their cause; To ensure emergency response plans are produced, reviewed, tested and exercised; To ensure the local authorities’ meet their statutory obligations and duties under primary legislation. To achieve these aims we must also: Ensure we have planned and prepared an organised and practical response by the Emergency Planning Unit and Councils we service; Effectively contribute to the combined response of all the emergency services and other agencies; Have plans that are sufficiently flexible to deal with a range of situations that may increase in significance, duration and complexity; Be able to respond to incidents that are outside the normal experience of the local authority; Ensure that appropriate staff are identified, have the knowledge and expertise to enable them to respond effectively to a major emergency and receive the right training; Ensure the provision of a facility (emergency control centre) within each local authority from which co-ordination of an emergency would take place; Be an integral part of the Cleveland Local Resilience Forum structure.