Environmental policy funding

The Inquiry heard evidence that the impact of public funding cuts fell disproportionately hard on metropolitan police services, such as Greater Manchester Police, compared with non-metropolitan services. In the event that public funding cuts are in the future considered necessary by the government, the Home Office should consider whether some funding arrangement for police services different from that...

The Home Office should consider how local resilience forums are to be funded consistently and sufficiently to enable them to do their important work.

The Home Office, the Department of Health and Social Care and the National Ambulance Resilience Unit should consider how to ensure that the role of an Ambulance Liaison Officer is properly resourced and also whether venue operators should fund the presence of an Ambulance Liaison Officer where one is required.

The Home Office should consider, together with local resilience forums, how they are to have sufficient staff and resources to enable them to function effectively.

A scheme for co-ordination between the planning authorities and the Health and Safety Executive should be devised so that the planning authorities may be advised on the safety problems involved in any proposed plant before planning permission is granted.

The question of crack propagation and detection in internally clad mild steel vessels and their protection from corrosion on the outside should be investigated as a matter of urgency.

We have pointed out in Paragraph 194 (c) above that the present situation regarding the licensing and storage of highly flammable liquids is unsatisfactory. We recommend review of the existing regulations.

It is recommended that consideration be given to installing devices or systems for recording vital plant information in a form which would survive the effects of fire or explosion. An example of such a device is the “black-box” used in aircraft.

Creep cavitation fractures in stainless steel have been known for some time but previously it had not been generally known that these could, under appropriate conditions of stress and temperature be produced in a relatively short time. Such a fracture can be produced in a matter of minutes by a small fierce fire. This phenomenon was demonstrated during...

Since many chemical plants contain zinc coated components, eg galvanised wire and walkways, it is important that the attention of industry should be drawn to these matters.

The cracked Reactor R2525 initiated the sequence of events which led to disaster. Examination of the crack by expert metallurgists showed that the crack had been caused by nitrate stress corrosion. This corrosion was created because nitrate treated cooling water had been used in the past to dilute some of the process liquids which contaminated the cooling water....