Examination of Witnesses (Questions 40-59)
THURSDAY 20 MARCH 2003
SIR DAVID
OMAND KCB AND
MS SUSAN
SCHOLEFIELD CMG
Chairman
40. Excuse me, it cannot be on a equal basis?
(Sir David Omand) No, a national basis, I meant.
41. Sure, but I would not want Mr Cran to think
that mid Wales is going to be perceived as posing a similar high
level target as London, Manchester or Birmingham and therefore
getting equal funds.
(Sir David Omand) It will be threat based.
42. What principle do you work on in terms of
allocation of resources to the regions or cities?
(Sir David Omand) In these national programmes the
overriding principle is the protection of the public, therefore
it has to be a threat-based analysis of where are the major risks
and vulnerabilities and what we know to be the threat.
Mr Cran
43. It is very kind of you, Chairman, to rescue
me in that way. I would like to move on. The question in one's
mind, I suppose, could be about over-stretch, because as you have
quite rightly said, the resources have to be married against likely
threats and you cannot devote resources for every conceivable
threat, it just is not possible, so the mean has to go somewhere.
So in a situation of over-stretch, which might occur in London
because it is London, are you confident that given simultaneous
attacks in London, the resources are available and the manpower
is available and so on to deal with those? Where does the manpower
come from if you needed more or if the emergency services needed
more?
(Sir David Omand) The emergency services have well-practised
arrangements for mutual aid and assistance. This is currently
being exercised by the police. The arrangements that we have are
adequate, we believe, to cover the circumstances which we would
predict. Where Susan and I are busily engaged is in building up
resilience to keep ahead of developments on the threat. Clearly,
there is no room for complacency at all, which is why we need
to push ahead as quickly as possible with the programmes we have
under way, so that we do build up the number of trained members
of the emergency services to ensure that they have even more equipment
against the possibility—the very real possibility—that
we may see an increase in the threat in the years to come.
44. So that I understand that answer, if there
were to be simultaneous attacks on London tomorrow, or next week,
next month or whatever, are you saying to me that yes, there is
manpower, equipment and all the rest of it there to deal with
simultaneous attacks, or not?
(Sir David Omand) That is not a question that is capable
of a yes or no answer. You could invent a scenario which would
test any system. My answer is to do with the range of circumstances
against which we and the police and the security service believe
we should plan. We have indeed very recently held a major exercise
with the police looking at simultaneous attacks in London, that
was done within the last three weeks, in order to satisfy ourselves
that we knew exactly how we would operate and the assistance that
would be needed. So it is very much in our minds and we do practise
it.
45. So the answer to my question is yes?
(Sir David Omand) It is a qualified yes because I
do not want to be put in a position, since I am speaking on behalf
of the Government, of having said we can cope with any conceivable
contingency because that is clearly never going to be the case.
You will always be able to invent a set of circumstances that
would stretch the emergency services. As I say, we are adequately
prepared for what we expect.
46. Wow! One last question, Chairman, and it
is simply this. You have been very careful this morning to say
that we are getting there, we are not there, we are not complacent
and all the rest of it. On the Richter scale of measurement where
are you in being able to deal with not the worst that could happen
but what might happen? Are you half-way there? Are you a tenth
of the way there? Where are you?
(Sir David Omand) Again, that is not a question that
is capable of a single traffic light answer: green, amber or red.
We are confident that we have taken steps, including the exercising
and training of those who would have to manage a major event,
to make us as well prepared as we can be. When I look ahead to
the years to come I do fear that we will see an increase in the
type of attack that international terrorist groups may try and
mount. We have therefore got to improve our national resilience
well beyond where we are now and that is our determination.
Mr Cran: I am not going to get anywhere.
Thank you, Chairman.
Chairman
47. We were told a lot about the planned exercise
later this month which was cancelled. Can you tell us why it was
cancelled?
(Sir David Omand) Postponed rather than cancelled.
To take up a very large amount of time of the emergency services,
particularly the police, at a time when we are expecting them
to move into overdrive for public protection did not seem a very
sensible thing to do. So we postponed the exercise and we will
fix a new date when it is clear that we do not have other competing
demands on the emergency services.
Jim Knight
48. Were the military going to be involved in
that exercise?
(Sir David Omand) No.
Chairman
49. I have been very much involved over the
years in election monitoring and people are quite keen in some
cases and not so keen in others to let us go trawling all over
their electoral arrangements to see how it works. The military,
NATO in particular, were very keen to have outsiders coming in
just to show how professional they are in running a major exercise,
far larger than the exercise that has been postponed. Are there
any facilities available for people to come and monitor an exercise,
people who are not part of the system but who would then be able
to give some form of judgment, maybe in private, as to how effective
that operation would be? If we believe in a degree of transparency
then that seems to be something that should be considered if it
has not been considered already.
(Sir David Omand) I am not aware of that having been
done in the past, I may be misinformed, particularly because the
exercises that I have been involved in have all had some component
of sensitive contingency plans being exercised which certainly
would mean that full transparency in relation to the public would
be difficult. I take the thrust of your question and we will think
about it.
Chairman: If you would, please.
Mr Jones
50. In some local authorities councils do take
a role in planned emergency exercises at a local level. In terms
of London, Sir David, clearly it is a priority and obviously a
lot of work has been done since we last took evidence on it and
even people like myself who represent constituencies in Durham
recognise the need for that work be done in London. Obviously
we are now into a situation where military action has started
or is on-going. Has the public message or threat risk to London
changed in the last 24 hours and how are you actually going to
communicate that to the public without scaring people to death
and trying to make sure that they know the level of risk that
is there at the moment?
(Sir David Omand) That is precisely the balance we
are trying to strike. I do not know whether the Committee are
aware, but the Home Secretary has made a statement this morning
to the House which covers precisely that point which I think has
just come out and in which he refers to the terrorist threat and
the concern in the present circumstances that terrorists may seek
to exploit the commencement of hostilities. I will not try and
add to what he has just said, but I think he has expressed quite
clearly what it is we expect. There is also a longer statement
which is on the new Home Office terrorism website, www.homeoffice.gov.uk/terrorism,
which went up on the web yesterday.
51. So what is the message you are trying to
send out? We were in the United States a few weeks ago and the
so-called orange alert created panic amongst quite a lot of people.
If you asked most Americans what the orange alert is I do not
think many of them would know, but there was a heightened sense
of fear from the people we talked to and there were some very
silly cases of people rushing out to buying duct tape and other
things. I appreciate it is a difficult balancing act to get the
message across, but what is the main message now that you are
trying to get out to the public in terms of both reassurance but
also heightened vigilance?
(Sir David Omand) I think you put it very well, it
is that the terrorist threat is real and it is serious and it
continues to be real and serious. We are not giving specific advice
to the public about measures they should take beyond expecting
them to be vigilant and where they have suspicions, to report
those to the police. There is a section in the public guidance
which covers how they could report any concerns they had to the
appropriate authorities. We are not giving advice about specific
domestic measures beyond what I would hope most households would
think of as reasonable anyway, of having some alternative means
of light and enough to drink and eat. Different nations have taken
slightly different lines on how much specific guidance to give
in relation to different kinds of terrorist attack. We believe
that it is better to issue that guidance when we know what it
is we are dealing with. In order to be effective we would have
to put out very comprehensive and detailed guidance of all the
different kinds of incident and circumstance. That detailed information
is available, for example, through the public health website for
the guidance of professionals, but as far as the public are concerned,
the basic message is if something happens, go in, stay in, tune
in and we will make information available through all the broadcast
and other media using the emergency arrangements which we have
set up on a contingency basis.
Mr Crausby
52. In the Home Secretary's ministerial statement
of 3 March, and he repeats it to some extent in his statement
today, he said that the first responder is the emergency services
and he mentions the major investment in equipment and training
and he goes on to itemise some of the things that have been spent.
Can you just tell us a basic figure as to how much has been spent
on the CBRN threat? Obviously you cannot deliver everything at
once, I think we all understand that from the point that you made
earlier about telling people and about it being not just about
equipment. What are the principal areas where significant investment
is still needed in both equipment and people?
(Ms Scholefield) If I may perhaps take the Committee
through the material we referred to earlier. First of all, for
the ambulance service, in this financial year we spent £5
million to purchase over 7,000 protection suits and 360 mobile
decontamination units in England; Scotland and Wales are together
purchasing just under 2,000 suits and 31 mobile decontamination
units. Our best advice is that as of today 94% of those suits
are now in place. There are only, therefore, just under 600 or
so awaited. On the decontamination units and this is just the
ambulance service, we understand that 70% of the units are now
in place. On the police, Winterbourne Gunner has delivered command
training for at least four commanders from each force and the
police now have over 2,000 officers equipped and trained in CBRN
response and that training is continuing. On the fire service,
there is a memorandum of understanding in place with the Department
of Health so that firefighters will support the ambulance service
by what is called a mass decontamination capability. The fire
service has secured £43 million of funding for this and the
Office of the Deputy Prime Minister added an additional £13
million, so that is £56 million for a national mass decontamination
capability.
Chairman
53. What did you say it was for?
(Ms Scholefield) For a national mass decontamination
capability. That procurement is also under way. This will give
a step change in the capability. At the moment the fire service
have about 4,000 gas tight suits and that procurement will double
the number.
54. The press are frantically writing and cannot
quite catch what you are saying.
(Ms Scholefield) Presently there are some 4,000 gas
tight suits with the fire service. That figure will double under
this new dimension programme and will also bring, for England
and Wales, 80 new vehicles and 190 purpose built decontamination
units. Those are each capable of handling some 200 people an hour.
In theory there is decontamination on-site for up to about 20,000
people, which is a real step change in the capability. In addition,
the Department of Health has procured vaccines, antibiotics and
specialist equipment for the treatment of infectious diseases.
A national smallpox plan has been developed and that was published
for public consultation in December 2002. Guidance on handling
infectious diseases and chemicals such as ricin has been disseminated
and is available on the Public Health Laboratory Service website.
That is additional guidance, as Sir David described, from the
Home Office.
55. Is there a typed version of this information?
(Ms Scholefield) This was what I was promising the
Committee in terms of a written statement which might be easier
to grasp than my reading it through. In terms of the roll out,
at the moment all the fire authorities have trained personnel
for the interim as opposed to that step change that I described.
Some 200 of the services' senior commanders have received multi-agency
training and we have discussed the importance of that; that continues.
The current position is that a further £3 million has been
invested by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister for training
and rescue. The fire authorities are actually quite key, they
do more than putting out fires including rescuing people from
collapsed buildings and that training is in place with a college
in Texas. There is then a proposal to secure funding for a major
national investment next year. This may be what the Committee
had heard through Chinese whispers and the issue you were referring
to earlier. I could go on, but perhaps it is easier in a note
for the Committee.
(Sir David Omand) Can I add one point since I am obviously
anxious that the Committee should hear all sides? Susan has given
an account of all the positive things, but we do have to ensure
that the fire service is trained on the new equipment which is
about to arrive. A large amount of money has been spent assembling
the "New Dimension" equipment and from next month we
will see this material being assembled centrally and then available
for brigades. Up to now the Fire Brigades Union has not been prepared
to participate in this as a result of their dispute. Clearly with
the equipment coming on-stream it is in the interests of public
safety—and it is really essential—that we have the
full co-operation of the Fire Brigades Union in taking forward
this important programme.
Mr Jones
56. Are they still taking the stance that they
are not going to co-operate?
(Sir David Omand) I am hoping that the dispute itself
will be coming to a resolution, but I understand there is to be
a second recall conference.
Jim Knight: There is a statement today
in the House.
Mr Jones
57. If it is not resolved, is the Government
going to take measures to ensure that this equipment, which obviously
will be vital in the next couple of months if we are to be on
a heightened terrorist alert, is going to be used? I do not think
the public would accept and I personally would not accept it if
equipment that had been bought to deal with a threat is sitting
languishing in stores because people will not use it.
(Sir David Omand) That would be a very serious situation
were it to develop over the next few months as the equipment becomes
available. The Government is well seized of it. I cannot say more
than that at the moment and you take me outside my brief.
Chairman: Without at this moment getting
involved in the conflict between Government and the Fire Brigades
Union, I very much hope that they would be prepared to take advantage
of the new equipment and to train up to the level necessary. I
would be very disappointed and, frankly, surprised if they were
not prepared to do this.
Mr Jones
58. Sir David, as the person who is heading
up our preparations that must be of great concern to you.
(Sir David Omand) It is of very great concern to me.
I am not directly involved in the resolution of the dispute itself.
In terms of the implications of not having this equipment service
when it is planned to enter service, that is very serious.
Mr Crausby
59. You have given us a good idea and you will
send us a note of what we have been doing. Can you tell us a little
bit more about next year's budget. Some of that overall budget
was announced in the 3 March statement, although I know you added
to that. It was a mixed message, it was about some numbers and
some figures. I think what people are really looking for is an
overall number as to what is being spent on our protection of
CBRN. Could you give us a figure for the next financial year?
(Ms Scholefield) For the coming financial year?
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