Community resilience
Community resilience
Community resilience is about local individuals and community groups coming together in the event of an incident or emergency and pulling together their local resources and expertise to help themselves and each other. This often complements the response provided by the emergency services and can be beneficial to all members of the community, especially in large scale events where the emergency responders' resources are stretched.
There are several ways in which you can help your community be more resilient, be it at work or at home. Simple steps such as knowing whether a neighbour or colleague may need extra help during a crisis and how you can help them is useful. Pay attention to anyone who may be vulnerable such as an elderly person, someone with a disability, a heavily pregnant lady, or those with babies or small children. Pass this information to the emergency services. Do not put yourself at risk.
Often those affected or displaced are being temporarily put up in a nearby rest centre. If you have skills which may be useful, you can offer to help out if necessary. For example if you can translate for someone else who can't speak English. Or offering someone a cup of tea and a listening ear can be very comforting during these times.
The voluntary sector is a great source of help to the emergency services during an emergency. You can become a volunteer to help improve community preparedness. There are many organisations which you can join including:
More information on how to get involved can be found on the Directgov website.
