SUSTAINABILITY

SANCTUARY
Feature
Public safety on the Defence Estate
and the MOD Access Forum
Attendees at the 2016 Access Forum getting a close up view of military training on Salisbury Plain © Crown
The changing face of military training,
moving back from operational-focused
training such as that for Afghanistan, to
core training, combined with the added
pressures of troops returning from
Germany, including mechanized
brigades and their associated vehicles
and equipment, mean that the training
estate is evolving once again and public
safety has to be paramount in the day
to day operation of the training estate.
Recent evidence has started to show
that operational and military training is
being compromised by a growing
number of incursions onto the estate
by the public while training is actually
taking place. This obviously has very
serious implications on the safety of
troops and members of the public.
As a result of the evidence of these
incursions, Defence Infrastructure
Organisation Service Delivery Training
(DIO SD Trg), who are responsible for
managing the MOD Training Estate,
made the decision to roll out a Training
Estate Public Safety (TEPS) programme.
The aims of TEPS are:
• To safeguard defence training whilst,
where possible, permitting safe
public access
• Provide public safety across the
training estate
• Identify existing control measures
and evaluate their effectiveness
• Look to the future and how
control measures might evolve with
new technology
An initial data gathering exercise for
TEPS covered flags, beacons and
signage and it was fairly apparent that
in many locations these were being
largely ignored, or their effectiveness as
control measures has diminished.
Whether this is a generational issue is
not known, but it is recognised that a
process of re-education must be
explored to try and increase the levels
of public understanding.
Working with the DIO Media and
Communications team, the DIO Access
and Recreation team (ART) are seeking
to increasingly use social media to get
the necessary safety messages out to
the public. ART have also developed a
standardised Access Information
Signage template to be rolled out
across all sites, displaying the relevant
safety information in a way that
promotes the 3 Cs’ ethos, that of Clarity,
Certainty and Consistency.
Another approach that ART adopt to
get the relevant safety messages out to
the wider audience is by hosting with
FMC and delivering the annual MOD
Access Forum. The aim of the Forum is
36
SANCTUARY 45 2016