Willie O'Dea (Limerick East, Fianna Fail)

I propose to take Questions Nos. 7, 13 and 28 together.

On Monday 14 April 2008, the public information and awareness campaign on emergency planning was launched at the National Emergency Co-ordination Centre. The main focus of the campaign was the publication and country-wide distribution of a handbook entitled Preparing for Major Emergencies. To coincide with the launch of the campaign, a three-week advertising campaign was undertaken to let people know about the handbook and to encourage everyone to read it. Advertisements were placed in national and provincial newspapers, on radio and on advertisement billboards around the country.

It is planned to review the impact of the campaign later in the year. Obviously it will be important to ensure that the information is relevant and up to date. However, the handbook is specifically designed to contain generic information which will not change. More detailed information is available on the website www.emergencyplanning.ie.

It is important that the information contained in the handbook is equally available to the new Irish communities. For this reason the handbook was made available on the website in Polish, Russian and Chinese. During the launch period of the campaign there were more than 3,000 hits on the website but it is not possible to say how many were from those communities.

As chairman of the Government task force on emergency planning, I am conscious of the need to maintain public awareness of the excellent work that is being undertaken in this area by Government Departments and public authorities and I will continue to encourage further initiatives.

See this speech in context