The Northumbria Local Resilience Forum (LRF) Community Risk Register (CRR) is published in compliance with the Civil Contingencies Act 2004 (Section 2 (1)) and is hosted on this site.
More information on the Civil Contingencies Act 2004 can be found at www.ukresilience.info
The CRR is an important document produced following extensive work by the partners within the Northumbria LRF area. The CRR provides a basis for local responders to consider which emergency plans are required and whether any existing plans should be modified in the light of the risk assessment.
The inclusion of these hazards or the particular scenario (for instance, the outcome description) does not mean that the Northumbria LRF believes the risk will materialise, or that if it were to do so, it would be at that scale. The risk scenarios are rather reasonable worse case assumptions upon which our risk assessment is based.
The likelihood assessments relate to the risk occurring over a five-year period at the magnitude reflected within the outcome description. The magnitude is based on an assessment of a reasonable worse case scenario.
As part of the risk assessment process, we have been considering the likelihood and impact of a range of hazards occurring. This work, a statutory requirement under the Civil Contingencies Act, is a continuing process and examples are provided for all of the hazards to illustrate the individual assessment work that has been completed so far. It is our intention to make further details available via this website as and when it is practical and appropriate to do so.
The attached risk assessments only cover non-malicious events (for instance, hazards) rather than threats (for instance, terrorist incidents). This does not mean that we are not considering threats within our risk assessment work, but given the sensitivity of the information supporting these risk assessments and the potential for use by adversaries, Central Government has advised that specific details should not be made available in the register published on this website. Threats scenarios that are being considered include, for example, conventional attacks using explosives, chemical/biological/radiological attacks, and electronic attacks such as affecting utility companies and communications.
Risk assessment is not a static process and is subject to constant review. As a result, the information contained in the register published on this website will be regularly updated.
The Northumbria LRF CRR has been produced by a Risk Assessment Working Group (RAWG) chaired by Ian Clough, County Emergency Planning Officer, Northumberland County Council. The CRR is based upon risk assessment work undertaken at a regional level, supplemented by local assessments carried out by local lead assessors who are members of the Northumbria LRF RAWG. The RAWG comprises representatives from the emergency services, Health and Safety Executive, Health Protection Agency, Environment Agency, Maritime and Coastguard Agency, utilities companies and local authorities in Tyne and Wear and Northumberland. Government Office for the North East has also played an advisory role.
Northumbria LRF Membership
The Northumbria LRF is established under the Civil Contingencies Act 2004. It’s members are as follows:
Category One Responders
Newcastle City Council
Sunderland City Council
Gateshead Council
North Tyneside Metropolitan Borough Council
South Tyneside Metropolitan Borough Council
Northumberland County Council
Alnwick District Council
Berwick upon Tweed Borough Council
Blyth Valley Borough Council
Castle Morpeth Borough Council
Tynedale District Council
Wansbeck District Council
Northumbria Police
British Transport Police
North East Ambulance Service
Northumberland Fire and Rescue Service
Tyne and Wear Fire and Rescue Service
Marine and Coastguard Agency
Environment Agency
Tyne Port Health Authority
River Blyth Port Health Authority
Health Protection Agency
Health Services:
North of Tyne Primary Care Trust (PCT)
South of Tyne Primary Care Trust (PCT)
Northumberland Hospital Trust
Newcastle Hospital Trust
Gateshead Hospital Trust
Sunderland Hospital Trust
South Tyneside Hospital Trust
North Tyneside Hospital Trust
Category Two Responders
Northumberland and Tyne and Wear Strategic Health Authority
CE Electric
Scottish Power
British Telecom
TeleWest
National Transcommunications Limited
Network Rail (GNER, Virgin, Northern Spirit, Arriva)
Health and Safety Executive
Northumbria Water Limited
Nexus
Port of Tyne
Newcastle International Airport
Highways Agency
Cellular Airtime Providers – 02, Orange, T Mobile, Vodafone
Voluntary Sector Representative
Military Representative, HQ 15 (NE) Brigade and No 2 Region
Regional Resilience Director Government Office for the North East
The Northumbria LRF area
The Northumbria LRF area is coterminous with the Northumbria Police Force area and comprises the County of Northumberland and the area of Tyne and Wear. It stretches from the border with Scotland around Berwick-upon-Tweed in the north to the City of Sunderland in the south. It also stretches from the North Sea coast in the east to the border with Cumbria in the west and has borders with County Durham in the south west. Northumbria sits within the Government Office for the North East region which contains similar LRFs at Cleveland and County Durham and Darlington.
Northumbria has an overall population of circa 1,381,000 (Office for National Statistics mid-year estimate 2002), clustered mainly in and around the Tyne and Wear conurbations. The main populated area of Northumberland is the south-east corner of the county and in rural parts of Northumberland, market towns are centres of population serving surrounding smaller villages.
Northumbria is served as follows:
- Major roads: A1 (M), A1, A19, A189, A68, A69, A696, A697 and others
- Major rail links: East Coast mainline to and from London and Scotland, Newcastle/Carlisle east-west link
- Newcastle International Airport
- Ports of Tyne, Sunderland and Blyth
- Metro
- Tyne Tunnel
Northumbria boasts the Northumberland National Park and Northumberland has several miles of coastline designated Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) as are parts of the North Pennines. There is a fine heritage of historic buildings, archaeological sites and monuments, including Hadrian’s Wall which is a World Heritage site.
There are several large shopping complexes, the largest being the Metrocentre, Gateshead, and there are large entertainment venues such as The Sage Gateshead and Newcastle Arena. Northumbria boasts two Premiership football clubs with stadium capacities of up to 52,000 and several smaller sporting venues, including a premiership rugby union stadium and an international athletics stadium.
Northumbria has a history of coalmining, shipbuilding and heavy engineering. Many of the traditional industries have been replaced by modern industrial developments and service based organisations. Some of the largest employers include Nissan, Scottish and Newcastle Breweries and Northern Rock.
There are currently nine top-tier COMAH (Control of Major Accident Hazard Regulations 1999) sites in Northumbria, seven in Tyne and Wear and two in Northumberland.
Contacts
Lead assessors who have produced risk assessments for the CRR are identified in Annex 1, together with their contact details. Please contact Lead Assessors direct regarding individual risk assessments.
To raise a general query about any other aspect of the CRR please contact the following:
Ian Clough
County Emergency Planning Officer
Emergency Planning Department
Northumberland County Council
Fire and Rescue HQ
Loansdean
Morpeth
Northumberland
NE61 2ED
Tel: 01670 534 705
Fax: 01670 534 620
Email: iclough@northumberland.gov.uk
Web: www.northumberland.gov.uk
