The Chief Executive of each of the 26 local authorities in Northern Ireland have been asked to prepare a plan for the provision of buildings and resources for emergency use.

The aim of the Emergency Plan is to:

• To enable Council Officers to participate fully in the response to a major incident
• To guide Council Officers in the co-ordination of a multi-agency recovery from a major incident in accordance with the principles of Integrated Emergency Management

The objectives of the Emergency Plan are to:

• Mitigate the effects of any major incident and enable a planned and co-ordinated recovery of the local communities from any major incident.
• Fulfil any statutory duty which may result from a major incident.
• Ensure the health, safety and welfare of all Council staff throughout the stages of any major incident.
• Carry out a qualitative risk assessment specific to the District Council area and undertake the necessary preparation and planning for any occurrence identified in that risk assessment.
• Identify essential Council services to the community and their continuation throughout any major incident.

What is a major incident?
It is any event (happening with or without warning) causing or threatening death or injury, damage to property or the environment or disruption to the community, which because of the scale of its effects cannot be dealt with by the emergency services and public service providers as part of their day to day activities. 

For the purpose of the District Emergency Plan examples of a major incident may include any of the following: road traffic accident, train crash or bomb explosion.

In such circumstances the Chief Executive of the Council will assume the role of co-ordinator.  He will also be assisting as appropriate the primary responding agencies, monitoring and reviewing the situation to see what improvements can be made in the arrangements.  This co-ordination role does not however give the Chief Executive power to direct other public agencies.  These agencies have statutory duties to perform and will continue to carry these out.