Community risks
The Cabinet Office is responsible for managing the National Security Risk Assessment (NSRA) – a classified cross-government and scientifically rigorous assessment of the most serious risks facing the UK.
The NSRA then forms the basis of the Community Risk Register (CRR), a more localised analysis conducted by Lincolnshire’s Local Resilience Forum (LRF). The organisation considers both documents, alongside data from historical incidents, to identify what types of incidents pose the greatest threat to the community.
We have also asked for the opinions and feedback from members of the community, running two engagement campaigns where we first asked for any risks the public felt should be added to the list from the previous IRMP for consideration, and then secondly, for the public to place the suggested risks for 2024-28 into order of importance.
We took the feedback from this engagement and combined it with our risk assessment to produce the following list of seven key community risks.
Dwelling (house) fire
According to the UK Census 2021, there are 298,100 households in Lincolnshire. Of these, 104,400 are rented, which is around 35% of the total number of households.
36% of all dwelling fires occur in premises where there is just one person living there.
Over the last five years, we have seen a steady reduction in the number of dwelling fires we attend, with 314 incidents attended in 2022/23.
An ageing population that may have more complex health and care needs present a particular risk that we will need to address through our prevention activities.
Road traffic collision
There are approximately 5,500 miles of road in Lincolnshire.
There were 439 people killed or seriously injured on Lincolnshire’s roads in 2022. This is a decrease from the 453 people killed or seriously injured in 2021, but still too high a number.
We have seen an increase in the number of RTCs we attend over the last five years, with 702 incidents attended in 2022/23.
Flooding
The number of flooding incidents we attend can vary from year to year, with an average of 160 a year.
In 2022/23, we attended 192 flooding incidents.
We have dealt with a number of large flooding incidents in the last few years, with the breach at Wainfleet in 2019, heavy rain in August 2022 flooding an estimated 100 properties in Spalding, Pinchbeck and Market Rasen, and Storm Babet in October 2023, where more than a month’s worth of rain fell in 24 hours causing flooding across the county.
Non-domestic fires
The greatest proportion of non-domestic fires were caused by an electrical fault (37%), followed by deliberate ignition and cooking appliances.
Over the last five years, we attended an average of 140 fires at non-domestic premises.
Wildfires
Although there is a specific definition of a wildfire, it can be taken to include most large fires in woodland, farmland or other open space.
The weather significantly influences how many incidents we attend, but there has been an overall increase over the last five years.
Deliberate fires (arson)
The highest number of deliberate fires involve refuse or grassland, with vehicle fires consisting of over a third of the fires that involve damage to property.
The overall number of these incidents we attend is rising, but the hot, dry summer of 2022 and the significant increase in grassland and field fires account for most of this increase.
Malicious attacks
The Government constantly assesses the threat to the UK from terrorism and communicates this through a threat level. This level has not dropped below substantial in the last five years, which means that an attack is likely.
There have been two periods of three months where the level was raised to severe, meaning an attack is highly likely.
Fortunately, no attacks have taken place in Lincolnshire; however, some locations and venues may be considered targets due to their historical importance or the number of people who might gather there.
LFR has taken part in operations with other agencies to assist in the investigation of activity suspected of being connected with a malicious attack.