UK Resilience
Private sector organisations are increasingly responsible for the provision of many essential services, including the manufacture, supply and distribution of items critical to the response to an influenza pandemic and to minimising its social and economic effects. Planning to ensure the maintenance of supplies and services for as long and as far as that is possible is an essential part of developing effective response arrangements. Sector-specific emergency arrangements to build resilience and develop effective response frameworks are already required, and plans are in place in most key sectors. Those frameworks should recognise the unique nature of the disruptive challenges that an influenza pandemic is likely to present. A wider community of industrial and commercial organisations also plays a direct role in maintaining social normality and will want to minimise potential losses from disruption to business and promote a return to normality as soon as possible.
Recognising the impact on the service provision that a pandemic would bring (perhaps from increased rates of absenteeism) the telecommunications industry would respond to a crisis by seeking to limit the impact on services by prioritising fault repairs at the expense of routine maintenance and the provisioning of new services. New services provided during such a crisis would generally be restricted to urgent requests from emergency responders recognised as Category 1 and Category 2 responders under the Civil Contingencies Act 2004.
Organisations planning to increase home working in a pandemic must talk to their telecommunications providers well in advance and will also need to ensure that they have the necessary hardware and software in place and appropriate arrangements to ensure support, oversight and audit of home workers.
Although there may at some point be some degradation of postal services due to a high level of staff absence at the peak of a pandemic, a wide range of postal operators will ensure that the sector maintains priority delivery services and essential postal communications.Any reduction to Royal Mail services would be managed in accordance with a list of corporate priorities reviewed by Postcomm, the industry regulator, which focus on maintaining those services involving high social responsibility (for example, access to cash/benefits). Normal deliveries and collections would be maintained as far as possible with any necessary managed degradation (for example, the number of collections during the course of the day may be reduced but final collections would be carried out to ensure optimum workflow). Continued access to the Post Office network (for example, for cash and benefits) will be maintained, with any local disruptions managed through contingency arrangements.
The provision of energy (gas and electricity) depends, at a high level, on a number of elements;(i) the primary 'production' of the energy, such as by the power station or the gas field/terminal; (ii) the transmission of that energy nationally; (iii) the distribution of that energy locally and (iv) the supply of that energy to consumers. Its possible, for an individual customer, that different companies may be responsible for each of these four elements in order to provide energy to that customers' site. Therefore it requires a cross industry effort to ensure that planning for an emergency (such as a possible flu pandemic) is effective in terms of providing energy to customers. The energy sector along with Government, the Regulator and the Devolved Administrations has been working for sometime to ensure this cross-industry preparation (for a possible flu pandemic) is undertaken and kept under review.
The energy sector is planning to maintain supplies of gas and electricity at near-normal service levels during a pandemic. Whilst routine maintenance is likely to be afforded lower priority if there are staffing shortfalls, essential repairs will continue to be carried out. Similarly, planning by fuel suppliers is aimed at maintaining near-normal levels. In both cases there may be some service disruption if peak staff absences coincide with technical or weather-related supply difficulties, leading to potentially longer periods of service loss than would normally be expected, and imports from main overseas suppliers may also be disrupted.
Pandemic planning in this sector is being led and coordinated by the tripartite authorities (HM Treasury, the Financial Services Authority and the Bank of England), which share responsibility for maintaining financial stability in the UK. Planning – involving financial firms, infrastructure providers and overseas financial regulators – is advanced and has primarily focused on business continuity (ie maintaining core business activities whilst experiencing above-normal staff absence levels) and provision of basic services, such as cash circulation, banking and payment systems.
Companies across the food sector will work together through their representative organisations and the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs to maintain supplies as far as possible. However, at the peak of the pandemic, there may be a reduction in choice and accessibility if some local outlets close due to non-availability of staff.
Public transport operators aim to run as near to normal services for as long and as far as that is possible during a pandemic and their plans provide for emergency timetables, redeploying staff and operating revised working (shift) patterns, if required. Although the Government is not planning to impose closure of transport hubs/facilities in the UK, all sectors may experience operational difficulties when the pandemic virus is circulating and staff absence levels are significantly higher than normal. The aviation sector may also experience difficulties if non-UK airports or airlines have operational problems or stop operating.
All water and sewerage companies have identified the minimum staffing levels required to maintain essential supply and sewerage operations, and have factored in potential staff absences in a pandemic scenario. As many key operations are automated, companies are confident that they will have sufficient staff to sustain these essential operations during a pandemic. Water companies have generic contingency plans for continuity of essential supplies. They have worked with suppliers and contractors to check preparedness arrangements, particularly in critical areas such as chemical supplies for water treatment.
Essential repairs to maintain water and sewage pipe work will continue, but staff shortages may reduce or halt non-essential work.
The Security and Emergency Measures Direction 1998 (SEMD) provides the legal framework within which water companies in England and Wales undertake planning for Water and Sewerage incidents and improve resilience of their infrastructure. In essence, it places a duty on such companies to have in place emergency plans, and in the eventuality of a incident, to make provisions for alternative water supplies, prioritising the vulnerable.
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