October again saw Wiltshire and Swindon LRF’s annual input to students at Bournemouth University’s renown MSc Disaster Management Course held at their Business Executive Centre.

Paul Williams, Joint LRF Manager, accompanied Debbie Haynes, Head of Dorset Civil Contingencies Unit, to spend an afternoon with the students. Debbie used to work at Wiltshire Council and still lives in the county. She was awarded an MBE in the 2025 King’s Birthday Honours List for services to resilience.

The session focussed on the structures employed for delivering resilience in England and Wales based around the Civil Contingencies Act 2004 with the emphasis on subsidiarity and the importance of the local level. The 42 LRFs in England and Wales are the principal structure through which resilience planning, response and recovery are delivered. It is important that students hear from experienced and knowledgeable practitioners who can discuss real scenarios that have happened, and they have dealt with. To this end, Wiltshire and Swindon LRF join with Dorset LRF to jointly deliver an input to the Course in conjunction with the Programme Lead, Dr. Christopher Baker-Beall.

There was an emphasis on ‘risk’ being the underpinning factor in driving preparedness through the National Security Risk Assessment (NSRA) and local Community Risk Registers (CRRs).  This was reinforced through an interactive session with the students. 

During the second part of the session, Paul and Debbie concentrated on the local effects of climate change. Paul outlined the severe flooding experienced at Chippenham and Bradford-on-Avon in November 2024 following Storm Bert and Debbie highlighted the challenges associated with wildfires which led to the declaration of a major incident in Dorset during the summer of 2025.

The session finished with an explanation of the Government’s recently launched Resilience Action Plan which provides an all-hazards approach with an emphasis on the whole of society and particularly supporting vulnerable people. It provides the strategic direction for resilience in the UK over the next few years. 

Bournemouth University’s Disaster Management Centre was founded in 2001 and enjoys an international reputation to undertake research into global disaster management. Their team works in both the UK and overseas to provide world-class training and technical assistance in disaster management.

Bournemouth University’s MSc Disaster Management Course is run on an annual basis to help prepare students with advanced knowledge and skills to lead on disaster management including risk reduction, resilience strategies, developing major incident management systems that respond to and help recovery from a range of disasters.

Every year, Paul and Debbie take time out and make their way to the South Coast to spend an afternoon with the students to deliver their input. This is the sixth consecutive year that they have had the pleasure to do so. Their sessions are designed to be interactive, and students are encouraged to ask questions and challenge how things work making for a rich learning environment for all. 

Paul said “This was another chance for Wiltshire and Swindon to collaborate with Dorset LRF to deliver to students from the coalface of local resilience. As we have seen time and again, most of the preparedness and responding to major incidents and disruptive events takes place at the local level. I hope our input complements the academic research the students are undertaking and brings a realism to their studies.”