Notting Hill Carnival Strategic Review - Intelligent Space

2.11 “Risk management at the Carnival is achieved by a combination of careful planning and realtime
activities. The latter is dominated by a huge police operation. Policing the Carnival
requires sensitivity to the needs and perceptions of the various interests involved, including
ethnic, local community and commercial groups. It also requires efficient and co-operative
relations with other organisations and emergency service agencies. The policing operation is
co-ordinated by a special operations room based at New Scotland Yard, which acts as a
communications centre, collates information and provides a liaison point with the emergency
service. A formal decision-making structure is organised according to a ‘Gold’ (strategic
command), ‘Silver’ (co-ordinator of the six geographical sectors), and ‘Bronze’ (sector
command) hierarchy.
2.12 An important finding is the perhaps surprising extent to which Carnival decision-making (or at
least the framework for decision-making) is pre-programmed, certainly at the strategic level or
involving inter-organisational relations. The Carnival has become a mature, well-practised
operation in which a multitude of tactical, incremental decisions, predominantly made at Bronze
level or below, serve to steer the huge, complex process. Once the Carnival is under way, there
is very little liaison between the police and other organisations. In practice, the MPS Gold
commander has an overseeing, monitoring role, intervening on a handful of occasions…The
stability that seems to arise from the incremental nature of the Carnival’s planning process does
present a severe difficulty: a lack of attention to the need to plan in strategic ways for future
developments.” 51
Carnival Public Safety Matrix
2.13 The LSE study raises a number of issues when one begins to ask the fundamental question of
who is ultimately accountable for public safety at the Notting Hill Carnival. Published guidance
by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) provides that it is the event organiser that has the
primary responsibility for protecting the health, safety and welfare of everyone working at, or
attending, an event 52 . In theory at least, LNHCL is recognised as the ‘event organiser’.
However, in practice, the Carnival Review Group questioned whether this had ever been the case.
The Carnival Public Safety Matrix set out at Table 3 below, provides an overview of the various
roles and responsibilities of the organisations involved in delivering the Carnival. When
compared with the roles assigned under the Statement of Intent and Code of Practice 53 , the
matrix begins to illustrate the way in which the powers and responsibilities in relation to the
planning and delivery of the Notting Hill Carnival are shared amongst a range of organisations,
with no one organisation taking an overall lead. Whilst in theory, a community–based
organisation in the shape of LNHCL 54 is seen as the ‘event organiser’, in practice and in relation
to the public safety aspects of the event, many of these responsibilities are being shouldered by
other members of the OPSG. The Carnival arenas and bands have a significant impact on a
51
Pp145-146 supra.
52
“The Event Safety Guide: A Guide to Health, Safety and Welfare at Music and Similar Events”, Health & Safety Executive (HSE), 1999.
53
See Table 2: ‘Statement of Intent and Code of Practice: Summary of Responsibilities and Designation of Lead Agency Status’ on p46.
54
LNHCL took over this role from NHCT in May 2003.
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