Asked by Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent To ask His Majesty’s
Government (1) when they became aware of yesterday’s fault with the
999 emergency system and (2) what action they are taking to ensure
the resilience of emergency communications. The Parliamentary
Under-Secretary of State, Department for Science, Innovation and
Technology (Viscount Camrose) (Con) A technical issue with the 999
public emergency call system was reported to us at 9.20 am on
Sunday 25...Request free trial
Asked by
To ask His Majesty’s Government (1) when they became aware of
yesterday’s fault with the 999 emergency system and (2) what
action they are taking to ensure the resilience of emergency
communications.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for
Science, Innovation and Technology () (Con)
A technical issue with the 999 public emergency call system was
reported to us at 9.20 am on Sunday 25 June 2023. This issue has
now been fully resolved and the service is running as normal. A
full investigation is under way to understand what caused this
problem. Ofcom has formally requested information from BT, using
its existing powers as the independent regulator. The Government
are conducting a post-incident report to identify actions that
will strengthen the resilience of the 999 public emergency call
service.
(Lab)
My Lords, this is an incredibly disconcerting event. We all rely
on the 999 emergency number as our ultimate safety net at times
of distress and vulnerability. Any failure in the system will
undermine faith in our emergency provision. We are seemingly very
fortunate that there was no major incident yesterday morning. Can
the Minister inform the House whether this eventuality—the loss
of the main 999 capacity—has been tested in any training exercise
for major incidents? Are the Government clear on what the
potential risks associated with the use of the back-up system
are, and what risk there might be to public safety as a result of
the system’s failure?
(Con)
Following the failure of the system, three strands of
investigation have been put in place. First, BT is performing its
own internal investigation. Secondly, Ofcom is engaging directly
with BT, which it is required to regulate. Thirdly, based on the
findings of those two, there will be the Government’s lessons
learned approach. The combination of all those will allow us to
learn lessons to improve future resilience of the system.
(LD)
My Lords, one of the worrying things about this incident is not
the failure of the main 999 service itself—although that is bad
enough—but the failure of the back-up as well. The Minister will
know that I have raised the issue of the changeover from analogue
to digital on a consistent basis, particularly BT’s digital voice
changeover. This changeover from analogue to digital creates huge
risks. Will the Minister say whether the incident report will
also include a wider look at the changeover from analogue to
digital? There are huge risks involved in this. This is critical
infrastructure, and in the case of emergency, it is even more
important that we have an analogue back-up to our digital
services.
(Con)
I pay tribute to the noble Lord’s frequent correspondence with me
on this subject and recognise the importance of what he says. I
do not want to prejudge the findings of the deep root-cause
analysis that will now be going on at both BT and Ofcom level,
but I will make sure that that question is at least asked, and
asked forcefully.
(CB)
The Minister must be deeply troubled that not one but two
critical technology platforms in our national security
infrastructure have failed in a very short space of time—the
Border Force as well as 999—and, in each case, as the noble Lord,
, has just said, with no
immediate back-up coming into play. Will the Government ascertain
whether any deep common causes underlie these failures and,
therefore, what other parts of our national technology structure,
not just our national technology security infrastructure, may be
at risk?
(Con)
Indeed, I recognise the risk that the noble Lord describes. One
of the absolute priorities must be to identify whether there is a
broader systemic risk of which the unfortunate events yesterday
were a symptom or whether this is isolated; the ongoing
investigation will absolutely establish that.
(Lab)
My Lords, I refer to my interests in the register, in particular
that I chair the National Preparedness Commission. As we
understand it, this was a failure of the 999 system itself. What
consideration have the Government given to circumstances in which
there is an interruption in electrical power? That could mean,
first, that there will need to be reliance on analogue systems—as
the noble Lord, referred to—but also
that most domestic landlines will cease to function and, within a
couple of hours, so too will most mobile phones, because masts
will no longer have power.
(Con)
It will be an area covered by the report. I stress that, from the
information that I have so far, BT was able to implement its
disaster recovery planning and system and return, albeit at a
slightly slower pace, to the ability to answer 999 calls. I very
much take the point that the wrong combination of catastrophic
failures would indeed create a very serious and broad
situation.
(LD)
My Lords, people dealing with a health crisis may call either 111
or 999 and each of those services will refer people on to the
other as appropriate. Can the Minister confirm that there are
protocols in place such that the operators of each service are
informed as soon as one of them goes down so that they can stop
referring people on, and whether there are protocols in place for
each service to handle the overload if one has gone down?
(Con)
It is an excellent question; I am afraid the truth is that I do
not know the answer at this point, but I will be happy to write
to the noble Lord.
(Lab)
My Lords, the Minister would be the first to agree that an event
of this kind is really serious. He has told the House when the
Government were informed. When did British Telecom first know
that there was a problem, how was it communicated to Ministers
and—once the inquiry that has now been indicated happens—in what
way, and when, will the House be informed of the outcome of it so
that we can discuss any of the consequences as a result of what
we find went wrong?
(Con)
I accept the great seriousness of the situation. The event that
caused the platform to go down occurred at 6.30 am on Sunday. The
Government were advised of the event at 9.20 am, so just under
three hours later. I understand that the Government were informed
as quickly as was practically possible. One area that the inquiry
will look into is whether that should or could have been faster.
As regards when and how the findings will be presented to the
House, let me think about the best way of doing so; I will commit
to sharing that in the most appropriate way.
(CB)
My Lords, the major response seemed to be to continue to dial
101. What worries about me about that is that at the moment the
average waiting time for people to get through on 101 is five
minutes, which is already hugely too long. If other calls go into
that system, then the call time can only get longer, and it
cannot discriminate between emergency and non-emergency
calls.
I have some worries in relation to announcements. First, there
was no announcement that the script that the call handlers were
using had been changed. Often people were trying to problem-solve
on the phone rather than just finding out what needed to happen
and then despatching resources if necessary. Secondly, I heard
nothing about officers or ambulance people getting out of offices
so that people could go to find them, if that was possible. That
is what happens with paramedics at the moment: they park up in
certain places, provided that those places are identified for
people to go to.
Thirdly, is it not time that we started having joint call
handling? At the moment we have three separate forces, and the
only reason why BT needs to take the call is that the ambulance
service, the fire service and the police have to take them
independently. You have to make a call to BT to declare which
service you require, often at a time when you do not actually
know which one you need. Why do we not answer them together? Why
do we not remove the cost that BT imposes on the whole system,
since it appears that it has not worked very well on this
occasion?
(Con)
There are a range of important questions there. First, BT
provides the service of call handling directly to the
communications providers. The CPs then act as they are required
to, as regulated by Ofcom.
On the question of the script, call handlers were required to
update their script because, once the disaster recovery system
had kicked in, it no longer provided geographical information and
therefore the script required them to ascertain the location of
the caller, which is normally done automatically. I forget some
other parts of the noble Lord’s question, but if he would like to
contact me for follow-up then I will be happy to answer them.
(Lab)
My Lords, given the serious nature and the longevity of the
system failure, was there a COBRA meeting about this incident? If
so, when did it meet? If it did not, is that because it was a
Sunday?
(Con)
To my knowledge, there was no COBRA meeting—I imagine because the
disaster recovery system kicked in and was able to meet the
emergency requirements.
(LD)
My Lords, I am sure that specific recommendations will come out
of the inquiry, but there should also be systematic ones that
apply to other areas of national infrastructure. This is not the
only single strand of infrastructure that is put in the hands of
one private sector company that keeps people’s services alive.
Will the Minister undertake that those systematic lessons are
applied across the piece and across government?
(Con)
I do not want to prejudge the outcome of the inquiries. If they
determine that there are systemic issues that need to be
addressed, then we will put in place a plan to address them.
(Lab)
My Lords, I ask this question as an ex-police and crime
commissioner. What assurances have Ministers sought from the
emergency services that there were no serious issues as a result
of the failure of the 999 system? Secondly, have they asked for
confirmation of that from both BT and the relevant emergency
services?
(Con)
Those questions will rightly be the focus of the ongoing
inquiries.
(Con)
My Lords, a number of noble Lords have already warned about
potential failures of other technology and a lack of resilience.
I shall add one more, referring particularly to the question from
the noble Lord, , about the switchover
from analogue to digital. There is concern in some quarters about
the impact that will have on monitoring devices, especially for
people receiving social care or healthcare in their home. Could
the Minister update us on the conversations going on within
government to make sure that, when that switchover comes, either
the devices that no longer work will be replaced or a way will be
found to use those devices on the digital network?
(Con)
I recognise the importance of those questions, particularly with
respect to our ambition to provide technology that is available
to all at all times. The questions will also quite rightly be an
important part of the ongoing inquiries.
(Lab)
My Lords, yesterday the northern part of the UK experienced very
heavy, intense thunderstorms. Communities rely on the emergency
services; they also rely on access to the 999 telephone service
to access those emergency services when there is flooding and
other, associated incidents. Will that level of resistance be
built into the inquiry to ensure that future systems operate in
the best possible way to achieve the best possible outcomes for
all communities throughout the UK?
(Con)
I recognise the value of what the noble Baroness is bringing out.
The scope of the inquiry must remain: what went wrong, what were
the impacts and what do we therefore need to fix? Questions about
the future improvement of the overall telecommunications network
in the country are also, no doubt, critical, but I do not believe
that they are part of the scope of this investigation.
(CB)
My Lords, what protocols are in place to test the resilience of
such systems before they go down?
(Con)
I recognise the question, but we are entering an area of
technicality that is, I am afraid, slightly beyond my knowledge.
I am happy to write to the noble Baroness on that point.
Baroness O'Grady of Upper Holloway (Lab)
My Lords, can the Minister tell us whether BT, a private company,
has been subject to a minimum service level requirement? If it
has been deemed to fail that minimum service level requirement,
what sanction will it face?
(Con)
I do not want to prejudge the investigation—
Noble Lords
Oh!
(Con)
How can I? BT is required by Ofcom to answer 95% of calls in five
seconds or less. As to how many of those have been missed at this
point, subject to the ongoing inquiry, I do not know.
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