An Okehampton town councillor is calling on the community to create an official emergency plan to help blue light services work effectively with local groups in the event of a disaster.

Cllr Terry Cummings has asked those who could provide help to residents in a major emergency – such as a fire, a flood or a major crash – to register their details. These will be then be compiled into a document for the emergency services to use to coordinate a community response to any serious incident in the area.

He said: “We already do this as a community. We’ve got support groups like the Lions, Made-Well looking after vulnerable people; we’ve got hundreds of voluntary groups around the area that already come together in an emergency. Take the Promise School fire. The fire brigade all rushed up there from all over the county. There were so many people up there, and the local pubs and takeaways started feeding them sandwiches and pizzas, taking drinks up and things like that.

“We are not trying to reinvent the wheel — it is about pulling the information together so people know who they can contact.”

Okehampton already has an emergency plan, but Cllr Cummings said he was calling on groups to produce a more comprehensive, up-to-date document. The aim, he added, was not to create new groups or replace the emergency services but rather to support the blue light services and make collaboration between groups easier, especially in the aftermath of a major event.

He said that major floods in other towns, such as Boscastle and Helston, had highlighted the importance of having an emergency plan in place to provide immediate support and longer-term assistance: “You have the initial flood, you have all the rescue services that go in and support people, getting them out, making sure they are safe,” he said. “Then it’s about the support structure after the incident as well.”

He hopes to alleviate local groups’ potential concerns about the bureaucracy involved, insurance policies and unnecessary training, which might put them off joining the plan.

“I think it was made out to be more complicated than we envisage,” said Cllr Cummings. "It's about avoiding all the red tape and making it a simple process.

“All these groups have their own insurance policies. If volunteers get involved, then there are various insurance policies that cover them, and I'd like to invite the people from Gold Command [ the highest level in the emergency service command structure] to come and allay some of the fears about the training and all that because it's just about doing what these people do every day in their lives.”

The Government is currently encouraging all communities to put together a community emergency plan in order to relieve pressure on the emergency services during a major incident. The UK Government Resilience Action Plan states that local groups’ “deep understanding of local needs, ability to build trust within communities, and specialist capabilities make them an essential partner in emergency planning, response and recovery”.

Anyone interested in helping form the emergency plan, or wanting more information, can contact Terry Cummings by emailing: [email protected]