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Schools Emergency, Business Continuity and Recovery Plan
All schools are welcome to use the Schools’ Emergency, Business Continuity & Recovery Plan.
The plan contains advice and support to help schools respond to different types of emergency. You should personalise the plan for your school.
You can download the plan in Word and PDF formats on the following link:
Please email emergency_planning@sandwell.gov.uk if you have any questions or feedback.
Martyn's Law for schools
Martyn’s Law, The Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Act 2025, places a legal requirement on schools, to consider the risk of terrorism and put proportionate protective security measures in place. Early years, primary, secondary and further education settings that expect to have more than 200 persons on the premises at the same time will be in scope of the Standard Tier requirements.
Under the the Standard Teir, premises are expected to put in place proportionate, low burden measures including;
• Ensuring there are simple, documented public protection procedures for responding to different incidents; invacuation, lockdown, evacuation and communication.
• Providing staff and pupil awareness training to communicate these procedures (e.g. recognising suspicious activity, knowing emergency actions such as RUN, HIDE, TELL) and conducting emergency drills.
• Nominating a responsible person to ensure compliance.
The Home Office has published statutory guidance Martyn's Law: Statutory Guidance intended to assist those responsible for premises and events in scope to understand the requirements set out in the legislation.
Importantly, the expectation at Standard Tier is that schools will not need to make significant or costly physical security upgrades. It is up to the responsible person to consider what is appropriate and reasonably practicable in relation to each public protection procedure.
There is no statutory requirement in the Act to make any physical alterations or to purchase specific equipment relating to putting public protection procedures in place. However, it may be that in certain circumstances it is reasonably practicable to do so, and this will depend on the context of the school.
The focus is on embedding good practice, awareness, and clear response procedures; building on arrangements many schools already have for safeguarding and emergency planning.
Protective security and preparedness for education settings
Guidance on protective security and preparedness for education settings (Protective Security: Education Settings) has been developed in collaboration with the National Counter-Terrorism Security Office (NaCTSO) and sector partners.
Training and engagement for schools
We deliver training and workshops providing an insight into emergency management and an opportunity to test the effectiveness of current plans.
Our training package can include:
- Introduction to managing emergencies in schools
- School specific scenario workshop
- Debrief and recovery advice
- Business continuity advice
General advice is available to all Sandwell schools. Training workshops are available upon request, free of charge, to Sandwell maintained schools.
Please email emergency_planning@sandwell.gov.uk for more information.
School trips
Throughout the year schools, Duke of Edinburgh award groups, youth clubs and children's services provide children with visits to outdoor education centres, museums and various other venues.
Sandwell Council's Resilience Unit works with the Educational Visits Team to support the visits by making sure all the relevant details are recorded.
This ensures that in the event of an emergency we can facilitate and support the provision of this information to the emergency services and other council services as appropriate.
If your school needs support or advice in an emergency situation on a school trip:
- Please call our Community Alarms service on 0121 569 6800 who will contact the Duty Emergency Planning Officer.