How do we do it?

The Purpose of the Essex Resilience Forum

All the organisations that make up the Essex Resilience Forum work together to ensure that the best possible preparations and plans are in place for major emergencies and incidents affecting the county.  These are regularly reviewed, tested and updated so that agencies can respond immediately and effectively to any threat or incident, however complex.

All responders work to a set of common objectives which will help to:

• Save lives
• Relieve suffering
• Prevent the disaster getting worse
• Restore normality as soon as possible
• Protect property
• Protect the environment
• Facilitate a criminal investigation and judicial processes as necessary

 

Who Are We?

A number of agencies and organisations come together in partnership to create the Essex Resilience Forum.  The Civil Contingencies Act gives a category to the different agencies and organisations that belong to the Forum; those involved in responding are defined as Category 1 Responders and those who may be called upon to provide essential support or advice during an incident are Category 2 Responders.  An organisational chart is shown below.

 

The Chair of The Essex Resilience Forum

                                                

Rick joined Cambridgeshire Fire and Rescue Service in 1997, progressing through various roles to become Head of Community Safety. In 2016, Rick became Assistant Chief Fire Officer in Cambridgeshire, and in 2019, he joined Essex County Fire and Rescue Service as Deputy Chief Fire Officer, overseeing strategic planning, assurance, performance, and collaboration.

In January 2022, Rick was appointed Chief Fire Officer and Chief Executive of Essex County Fire and Rescue Service. He holds a Master’s in Public Administration from Warwick University and is married with two children.

 

The Vice Chair of The Essex Resilience Forum

                                          

Ben-Julian Harrington QPM is a British senior police officer who has served as the Chief Constable of Essex Police since October 2018. He started his policing career with the Metropolitan Police Service in 1990, where he worked in Chingford and Walthamstow. He is married to another Metropolitan police officer and has two daughters.[1] Prior to becoming Chief Constable, Harrington was the Temporary Deputy Chief Constable of Essex Police.[2]

He was awarded the Queen's Police Medal (QPM) in the 2022 New Year Honours.[3]

Our Workstream & Group Structure

The Essex Resilience Forum operates a planned work schedule managing multiple workstreams from risk management, plan development and training & exercise creation and delivery. These workstreams are managed by specific individual groups which contain professional team members from all partner agencies across Essex who specialise in the groups dedicated focus.

The diagram below details the specialist groups set up to manage the ERF projects and workstreams