Opening Remarks: Emergency Management System Reforms 

The New Zealand Government recently announced its response to the recommendations of a Ministerial review into Delivering better responses to natural disasters and other emergencies. The Government’s response to the review sets out a broad, multi-year work programme that will deliver extensive change to New Zealand’s emergency response system. This programme is referred to as the ‘Emergency Management System Reforms’, and involve the following key focus areas:

• Putting the safety and wellbeing of people at the heart of the emergency response system
• Strengthening the national leadership of the emergency management system
• Making it clear who is responsible for what, nationally and regionally
• Building the capability and capacity of the emergency management workforce
• Improving the information and intelligence system that supports decision making in emergencies

David Coetzee’s opening remarks will focus on some of the specific initiatives that are now underway to give effect to specific recommendations, that will likely be of interest to the ISCRAM community. These initiatives involve work towards establishing a ‘Common Operating Picture’, investigations into a new National Emergency Management Facility, the establishment of rapidly deployable ‘Fly-in Teams’, and a review of the Coordinated Incident Management System (CIMS) - New Zealand’s version of the traditional Incident Command System (ICS).

The review report and the full version of the Government’s response to the review can be viewed here.

Biography:

David Coetzee is the Manager, Capability & Operations at the Ministry of Civil Defence & Emergency Management. He is responsible for national response preparedness through the development of response capability, processes and systems, the National Crisis Management Centre, as well as managing the national warning system. Currently he also leads a review of the New Zealand Coordinated Incident Management System (CIMS).

David also holds the position of National Controller, making him responsible for leading the national level response to civil defence emergencies in New Zealand. In this capacity he has been at the helm in the National Crisis Management Centre for an extended list of emergencies and exercises; he singles out the Christchurch earthquake of 2011 that resulted in New Zealand’s first ever state of national emergency, and the Kaikoura earthquake of 2016, as the most challenging and demanding responses in his career so far.

In 2018 David received the Minister of Civil Defence’s Gold Award for significant contribution to Civil Defence Emergency Management for leading the establishment of the Emergency Mobile Alert system in New Zealand.

At the international level David serves on the Steering Group of the Pacific Tsunami Warning System under the IOC (UNESCO), who has called upon his experience to assist with tsunami capacity building in several regions. On behalf of the IOC (UNESCO) he also chairs a global working group on tsunami disaster management, public awareness and reduction. He is a past member of the United Nations Disaster Assessment and Coordination (UNDAC) team.

Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste: Setting the scene for exploring the opportunities that arise from disaster

Biography:

Lianne Dalziel is serving her second term as Mayor after serving for 23 years in the New Zealand Parliament, the last four terms as the Member of Parliament for Christchurch East. Lianne served as a Cabinet Minister in the fifth Labour Government under the leadership of Prime Minister Rt. Hon. Helen Clark (1999-2008).

During that time Lianne held a number of portfolios, including Immigration, Commerce, Food Safety, Women’s Affairs & Senior Citizens and associate roles in Education and Justice. She chaired the Commerce Select Committee from 2008-2011.

Given the impact of the earthquakes on the Christchurch East electorate, Lianne researched as much information as she could to ensure that she could inform her constituents about what was happening and also to help her understand what lay ahead in terms of recovery.

"Because I wanted to understand how other places had recovered from disasters, over the last couple of years I have read everything I could lay my hands on and attended every conference that was going. Some amazing international speakers have come to Christchurch starting with the locally organized TEDx and the International Speaker Series, which was part of the Share an Idea campaign.

"They opened up my eyes to the possibility of what we can learn from each other and that we here in Christchurch do not have to reinvent the wheel. The offers to help us on our journey have been heartfelt, which shows how much understanding there is between places that have been struck by disaster.

"What I learned early though is that it’s not a paint by numbers exercise and that even with all of the offers of help, the future of Christchurch is one we will create for ourselves."

Lianne was invited to join the UNISDR’s Parliamentary Advisory Group on Disaster Risk Reduction in 2012. With this background, Lianne has become a champion of resilience, with Christchurch selected as one of the first tranche of cities to participate in the 100 Resilient Cities Network pioneered by the Rockefeller Foundation.

"Resilience is a journey, not a destination. My aspiration for resilience is based on the belief that governments - central or local - cannot do as well as can properly resourced and supported communities do for themselves in determining their own destiny. It is about being well-informed, adaptive and able to work collaboratively to co-create that future."

Lianne is committed to Christchurch remaining New Zealand's Garden City, but at the same time seizing all the opportunities we now have.

"Christchurch is a city of opportunity - we are open to new ideas, new people and new ways of doing things - a place where anything is possible."

Biography:

Simon Dunstall leads the Decision Sciences program in CSIRO Data61.

Data61's mission is to promote a flourishing national ecosystem of researchers, developers and innovators in digital technologies and data-driven businesses. The Decision Sciences program has 100 staff members and a much larger network of collaborators, and has foci including social media analytics, information systems engineering, natural hazard risk modelling, optimisation, and finance and superannuation research.

Simon is a researcher in analytics and optimisation. His recent work includes the development of infrastructure network planning systems and the development of methods for quantifying and managing the bushfire-related risks posed by powerlines in Australia. In addition to his role at CSIRO, Simon is the current national president of the Australian Society for Operations Research (ASOR).