Stratford Guild talk Thurs 15 January - REVIEW

Stratford sub Castle Guild 15 January 2026  “Local Disaster Management and Recovery” Speaker - Chris Manuel

Thirty-four members and guests ignored the heavy rain outside and settled down for a 2 o’clock start to the first talk of the New Year.  What a fascinating and informative talk it turned out to be on an organisation that many of us have never heard of before.

Chris Manuel, the Community Resilience Lead Officer for Wiltshire and Swindon Prepared, a multi-agency local disaster management and recovery organisation, guided us through the procedures that they adopt to identify potential risks, produce emergency plans and reduce the impact of incidents and disasters in our communities.

There are two categories of responders to incidents.  Category 1 includes the flashing blue light people (ambulance, police and fire services), plus the County Council, Environment Agency and British Transport Police. In Category 2 are the Samaritans, Red Cross, the Met Office, Ministry of Defence, Wessex Water, Gas and National Highways. These organisations all get together twice a month to discuss how best to respond to emergencies.                

'Plan, Respond and Recover 'is the mantra that guides them. During an emergency ambulance, police and fire service are first on the scene, then once the emergency passes the local authority takes over.

Wiltshire and Swindon Prepared locally plan for floods, particularly in the Salisbury and Malmesbury areas, snow, plane crashes (we are in a military area) and fuel disruption. Chris asked us to place a list of six examples of emergency in their risk order.  Understandably, a pandemic came out top of the risk list, followed by river flooding and fuel disruption (often caused by public panic about shortages).  The others were plane crash, volcanic eruption and bridge collapse in that order. The mention of volcanic eruption was a bit surprising in a country like ours, but Chris explained that an eruption in Iceland could have a serious knock-on effect in the UK. Dust from the eruption could close down flights and did so a few years back.

Planning locally for a pandemic had gone on for years, for example during the foot and mouth scare in the early part of the century.  However, during the major pandemic of 2020, central government took over, issuing directives above those of local organisations. Chris emphasised that the organisation learned a lot during the pandemic, particularly at a local level where people helped out the vulnerable in their neighbourhoods.

The Novichok scare of 2018 became a massive part of the organisation’s time and presented additional problems for them. Visits from senior politicians and royalty provided serious security issues in themselves.

Chris pointed out that the major problem is deciding how best to communicate with the public.  In an era of fragmented media usage, it is difficult to contact everybody effectively.  The days when massive television audiences could be contacted via a nationwide advertising campaign are long gone. Younger generations tend to use social media but others don’t.  Booklets have their part to play, but these are more likely to be read by older generations. He found contacting primary school children was a cost-effective way of getting a message across, because their enthusiasm carried over to their parents. A captive audience could be found in dental, doctor and hospital waiting rooms, and these could be a good place for a screen message, a poster or a booklet.

This was a very informative and stimulating talk that stirred the audience into asking a series of interesting and challenging questions which Chris handled with aplomb.

Our next meeting is 12^h February (2pm start) when John Handby, a leading Information Technologist will explain AI, how it affects us and the major implications for society.

Peter Westmacott