Initial feedback from London Emergency Planning Seminar – 17 March 2006

Report: 11
Date: 6 April 2006
By: Chief Executive and Clerk

Summary

The purpose of this report is to outline the initial feedback from the London Emergency Planning Seminar at City Hall on 17 March 2006. A more detailed paper with the key outcomes from the event will be submitted to the next Equal Opportunities and Diversity Board (EODB).

A. Recommendations

That members agree:

1. To note the contents of this report.
2. To receive a report of the London Emergency Planning seminar at the next EODB.

B. Supporting information

Background

1. Following events in July 2005, disabled representatives and community groups made recommendations regarding how London Resilience (e.g. the key agencies involved in emergency planning and response – Appendix 1 provides a list of partners) would respond to the needs of disabled people in the event of an emergency. The purpose of the seminar was three-fold:

1. To raise the profile of how London plans for emergencies in relation to disabled people
2. Defining the equality and diversity issues in London’s resilience plans; and
3. To explore and further refine the key issues and solutions in the resilience plan for disabled people, developing and communicating in partnership key reassurance messages.

2. In devising the seminar, three key objectives emerged:

1. To work with disabled people to identify gaps in the Emergency Planning and to devise strategies to meet their needs
2. To devise communication strategies to inform London’s disabled communities what is in place in the event of an emergency and explain how their needs would be met; and
3. To begin the process of getting all of the Resilience partners to ‘sign up’ to the social model of disability

Discussions and initial feedback

3. The seminar was a mixture of questions and answers posed by disabled people to the emergency planning services in the morning, followed by workshops in the afternoon. In the workshops, disabled people had the opportunity to work through ‘critical incident’ scenarios. The seminar concluded with a summary of the feedback from the workshops being posed to senior and chief officers, who were then asked to respond to the feedback and commit to the social model of disability. (defined in Appendix 2)

4. In total 132 people attended the event, including support staff. Alice Maynard, Director of Future Inclusion, chaired the event with workshops facilitated by disabled people. A breakdown of attendees is contained below:

Key outcomes

5. Some of the key outcomes emerging from the event included:

• All the Resilience partners committed to sign up to the social model of disability
• There is a need for disabled people to be actively involved in the design of emergency planning
• There is a need from statutory agencies to have disability equality training
• There is a need for disabled people to be heard and listened by agencies, but also to have their experiences to date acknowledged
• There is a need to look at the multiple aspects of social identity and the need to explore the diversity of disabled people within any future work on emergency planning

6. As stated, a more detailed report will be submitted to EODB in July 2006. This report will take into account post-seminar feedback from the MPS Disability Independent Advisory Group (DIAG), the Disability Oversight Group and the Conference Steering Group. It will also take into what steps both the MPA and MPS will take in demonstrating their commitment to the social model of disability.

C. Race and equality impact

1. Delivering this event has assisted in developing emergency services that are relevant and accessible to disabled people. This assists statutory agencies with meeting their forthcoming disability duty under the Disability Discrimination Act (1995).

2. However, there is a need for emergency planning services to do more than consult, but to actively engage and involve disabled people in the design of services – emergency or otherwise.

D. Financial implications

1. The cost of this event was £17,284.33. Though monies were available from Resilience partners, all the costs for this event were met in its entirety by the budget from the MPA Race & Diversity Unit.

E. Background papers

• Disabled People & Policing – A New Deal?
• Steering Group papers

F. Contact details

Report author: Laurence Gouldbourne, MPA

For more information contact:

MPA general: 020 7202 0202
Media enquiries: 020 7202 0217/18

Appendix 1

List of resilience partners

• Metropolitan Police Authority
• Transport For London
• Metropolitan Police Service
• Greater London Authority
• London Development Agency
• London Fire and Emergency Planning Authority
• London Ambulance Service
• British Transport Police
• City of London Police
• Government of London
• National Health Service
• British Telecom
• The Salvation Army
• Network Rail
• London Rail

Appendix 2

Social model of disability

The social model of disability says that people who have impairments or medical conditions are disabled by physical and social barriers. The difference between impairment and disability is that impairment limits what someone can do physically or mentally, whereas disability limits their ability to take part in the normal life of the community on an equal basis.

The social model was developed by disabled people in opposition to what came to be known as the individual or medical model of disability. The key difference between these two models is the location of the 'problem'.

In the medical model, disabled people are unable to participate in the community as a direct result of their impairment; impairment causes disability. So in the medical model it is a disabled person’s personal tragedy that they are excluded and this is ‘incurable’, but in the social model exclusion is a social problem and it can be rectified by society removing its barriers.

Barriers that typically prevent disabled people participating fully in society and which need to be removed can be considered in a range of ways:

• Information and communication barriers
• Physical barriers
• Policy or procedural barriers
• Attitudinal barriers

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