Michael Ryan’s outburst at Hungerford in 1987 caused the Telephone Preference Scheme to be put into operation for the first known time in twelve years. (1) The system seems to have been less useful than might have been hoped. Other telephone voice communication systems, already in place but generally unavailable, could be used in a civil emergency. One, designed to lie fallow until transition to war, is partly funded by local authority emergency planning departments.
The Telephone Preference Scheme
The Post Office Telephone Preference Scheme (TPS) was instigated during the last war and standardised in 1953 as part of the nuclear war preparations. (2) It was described in Home Office circulars to local authorities in 1962 and 63, then updated and re-described in Home Office Circular ES5/1975. The relevant documents were marked ‘RESTRICTED’. ES5 carried the additional warning:
‘The information contained in these documents is not to be communicated directly or indirectly to the Press or to any person not authorised to receive it.’
Since the circular was headed ‘Communications in War’, the level of secrecy was predictable. In the mid-70s most County Emergency Planning Officers were gentlemen of a military background, accustomed to plotting the survival or destruction of the civilian population in total secrecy. By the mid-1980s the situation had changed; in July 1987, following extensive ‘leaks’ about TPS (by this time renamed GTPS or Government Telephone Preference Scheme), the details were declassified. (3)
Under GTPS, the telephone system is divided into three categories. Category 1, roughly 2% of the system, applies to ‘those lines vital to the prosecution of war and to national survival after an attack on the United Kingdom’. Category 2, a further 8% or so, covers ‘those additional lines necessary to maintain the life of the community during civil emergency‘. The rest of us are on Category 3, ‘lines for which there is no entitlement to any preference‘.(4) There are exceptions both official and unofficial to the preference percentages. Within the Whitehall CBX complex, provision has been made for between 10 and 15 percent of outgoing lines to be put on Category 1. Where a PBX (private exchange) is concerned, more preference lines may be given where there is spare capacity at the public exchange or where it is possible to arrange ‘out-of-area’ lines to another switchboard. Doctors in some areas have been placed on Category 1 by individual telephone engineers.
The decision on Category allocation is made by each relevant Government department, with the Cabinet Office as final arbitrator. Responsibility for lines relevant to local government (County bunkers, emergency and community centres, refuse collection and sewage works) has been delegated to Local Authorities. Nationalised industries are similarly able to make their own recommendations; private industries were, prior to declassification, allocated fines without their knowledge. Following declassification and denationalisation they may now be on the same footing as local authorities. (5)
The ‘Restricted’ approach to TPS led to a fiasco after Local Government reorganisation. British Telecom requires that relevant numbers be nominated annually; otherwise the lines are put back onto Category 3. Unfortunately the new local authorities were considered to be separate bodies from the old, so Telecom felt unable to disclose which lines were already on TPS (and why). Emergency Planning Officers were left in something of a quandary. A further oversight affects PBX systems. Although several extensions from a private exchange may be placed on TPS, the civil service has generally avoided pointing out to the owners of the switchboard that the extensions will not function without either mains or back-up power. A designated organisation attempting to use its premises for emergency coordination during a flood or hurricane could find itself unable to communicate with the outside world unless its co-ordinators were to make all calls from the switchhoard itself.
The decision to activate TPS in an emergency is theoretically under the control of Telecom and central government. There is no official provision for a local authority, for example, to demand level 2 working in a local crisis such as the Manchester Airport crash. However, as with requests for military assistance, the focus may be shifting towards the police. It is known that at Hungerford, the Thames Valley force made the approach to British Telecom.
According to J B Hopkins (6):
‘In some circumstances, the need for control of telephone traffc can first become apparent to those agencies who are ‘managing’ any peacetime emergency. Consultation with BT could result in actions, one of which might be the implementation of the Preference facility, as indeed happened at Hungerford’ (emphases added)
Apparently BT is able to decide for itself, so far as peacetime implementation is concerned, what action to take. It seems anomalous that a private company is able to overrule, perhaps on commercial grounds, those responsible for emergency co-ordination.(7) Mr Hopkins wrote his letter two months after the declassification of GTPS. He still felt it necessary to mark it ‘IN CONFIDENCE’. Oddly, as he goes to say:
‘It goes without saying that we would, if circumstances were moving toward a Preference activation decision, try to warn all customers likely to be affected of the possible action eg, via a local radio announcement’.
Confidentially, of course.
There seems to be some degree of schizophrenia attached to BT’s regulations. Mr Hopkins’ letter continues:
‘And the decision to activate would be taken objectively and at a very senior level. But many instances escalate to crisis level so quickly that the immediate action is obvious and is often taken by the first engineer to recognise the crisis.’
At the request of the police, or by management decision. or on the whim of a local operative? Perhaps all three: according to the engineers concerned, about 50 local exchanges were put on to Preference 2 during the October 1987 hurricane. Decisions were reportedly ad hoc: and effected without specific authority. Does the system work? So far as civil emergencies are concerned, the answer seems to be no. Implementation of the scheme cuts off 90% of those wishing to dial-out. It does not prevent ‘busying-out’ of the switchboard by incoming calls. Neither does it guarantee that those who most need to use a telephone in the particular circumstances will be able to do so. Further, if the power is down, telephone exchange reserve batteries may not last long. (8) As the journal Civil Protection said of the hurricane emergency:
‘Communication was dealt a body blow by the storm and greatly added to the chaos. There was a shortage of information on the state of public services, telephones did not work, radio and TV stations had difficulty broadcasting and even the emergency services had problems. The disruption was mainly caused by damaged telephone lines, loss of power to switchboards and exchanges, damage to aerial systems and radio networks and power problems with radio systems – for example when back~up batteries ran out within a matter of hours.’ (9)(10)
The Cellular Telephone Networks
When the police at Hungerford discovered that the telephone system was effectively inoperative despite the instigation of Preference working, they took a further step. Unannounced and without reference to the customers, a part of the Racal Vodafone system was allocated to the constabulary. (11) So far as is known. no part of the cellular telephone network has been used in this way before, though it is understood that its use in transition to war is currently being considered. There seems to be little reason that it could not he included in formal civil emergency planning. Vodafone seem to have been pleased to have been of assistance in providing telephones and eliminating problems. In this particular case, provision may have been influenced by the fact that the company headquarters is located in nearby Newbury.
Emergency Manual Switching
Those actively involved in dealing with a civil emergency might feel that a dedicated telephone system running parallel to the normal one but reserved for their use would be mightily useful. It would be hugely expensive to install and to maintain; it would involve the laying of a new country-wide network of cables and the installation of separate switchboards immune from jamming by the public at large. Such a system would run on landlines, to avoid atmospheric effects. It would connect, for example, County Emergency Centres, the emergency services, the WRVS, airports, the headquarters of British Rail and underground railways, nuclear facilities and chemical works and so on: perhaps, at the fringe, the armed forces in case of need. But who would pay?
In the early 1970s, the military realised that transition to war and to Preference Level 1 working would have limited effect. Public exchanges might be sabotaged; telephone engineers could prefer being with their families to being at work; and one nuclear electromagnetic pulse (NEMP) could effectively take out every electronic exchange in the country, as well as destroying the microwave facilities upon which a great deal of communications equipment depends (12). For once. the cheap low-tech answer was the one chosen for the Ministry of Defence. Called EMSS or Emergency Manual Switching System, it consists of landlines separate from the normal telephone network and connected by old-fashioned ‘doll’s eye’ switchboards situated in the basements of major exchanges. Sabotage of or damage to above-ground equipment will have no effect. Use of manually operated switchboards removes the problem of high-voltage pulse damage and cuts the overall electricity consumption needed, ensuring that the system will be sustainable on battery power for long periods of time. EMSS allows communication only between wartime facilities. Although the list is similar to that devised for Preference Category 1, the number of lines available is much smaller. Whilst GTPS serves about 2% of telephone users, the emergency system has enough lines to serve about 0.04%. A city the size of Sheffield is likely to have an exchange consisting of no more than 200 lines; a county market town might have one switchboard with 50. It is not certain exactly when EMSS was installed. ES5/1975 gave the impression that the entire system was in place. Evidence given to the author indicates that major installation was still proceeding five years later. About half the lines are permanent rented connections. The rest would be taken from the public network ‘during the pre-attack period’.
Although the wiring is in place, the main exchange boards are not manned. So far as is known, the system has never been tested, even during joint military/civilian exercises. It is believed that, immediately after installation of the circuits, Telecom ‘lost’ or destroyed all records on grounds of security. This has rendered impossible any maintenance of the rapidly-corroding underground system; telephone engineers simply do not know where it is.
The costs of EMSS appear to be covered by the rented-line charge, typically about 1000 a year. By comparison, BT have quoted a rent of 50 for provision of an ex-directory line on the understanding that it is not normally used. The result is that County Emergency Planning Units are currently paying a large proportion of their budgets to British Telecom for a service which is unavailable. If charges for hired teleprinters and duplex equipment normally found in the bunkers is included, costs are typically in excess of 30,000 per annum.
Priority Operator Service
A hybrid scheme based on the familiar 999 call has been devised for wartime use. As the ES circular says in paragraph 15:
‘During and immediately after an attack, when the normal functioning of the public telephone service would be severely disrupted, the preference scheme…. might not ensure that vital calls reach the switchboard.
Consequently a complementary facility has been provided, which enables a small number of Category 1 subscribers to obtain priority attention from operators having access to the EMSS network, if the direct dialling system is not functioning. In the latter stages of a crisis letters would be sent by general managers to local telephone areas to selected preference subscribers, giving them a particular telephone number to dial to reach the EMSS operator. This number terminates on the switchboard and would receive priority attention over all other calls. The lists are compiled by general managers of local telephone areas in consultation with Home Office Regional Telecommunication Officers. (13)
Amongst the installations described as ‘in the priority list for this facility’ are county, district and London Group and borough wartime headquarters. The original issue of the circular insisted that county councils and chief police officers should inform the local telephone manager of their needs. The relevant sentence is absent from the revised version. In a letter sent to the Association of Metropolitan Authorities in July 1983, H. D. Hallett of the Department of the Environment referred to the Priority Attention Facility. By September of the following year, the facility seems to have disappeared. A letter to ‘All Principal Councils in England’, which concerns nominations for telephone preference, fails to make any mention of priority answering. (14) It does, however, claim to supersede those paragraphs of ES5/1975 which refer to such service. Priority answering may or may not still exist. It is believed that the original scheme would have related to some two per cent of GTPS Category 1 subscribers – about the same number of people as are intended to have direct access to EMSS. Either provision has been withdrawn from local authorities; or it has been withdrawn totally; or else the Home Office Telecommunications Directorate has taken sole responsibility for nominations. In any case, in wartime conditions the facility’s usefulness would be marginal. If the main switchboards had been knocked out by NEMP, dialling-in to any operator would be impossible What the system would have allowed was the making of long-distance calls where the local switchboard was still working
Private Lines
A final facility is the existence of privately-rented long-distance lines. These are held by emergency services and by many other large organisations. Commercially-held private wires are routed with the normal cables, and go in and out of exchanges on the main distribution frame, normally in the basement, without passing through the vulnerable switching gear. In wartime, it is likely that they will be amongst the lines usurped for EMSS. Private lines rented by the military are similarly connected at exchanges. However, they are otherwise ‘routed to avoid potential target areas’ and ‘can be made independent of mains power supply.'(15)
Public Interest and Public Emergencies
The existence of emergency telephone systems has apparently been kept hidden to allow war planners their customary secrecy. This attitude has resulted in the provision of powerful networks that could be, but are not, applicable to peacetime emergencies. Telephone Preference working existed in one form or another for more than forty years, but was not fully usable until the Home Office eventually decided to declassify it. Even after allowing public knowledge, the Government has expressed the view that its existence should be kept ‘low-profile’.(16) No press or radio report has mentioned its emergency use.
GTPS cannot work efficiently if only one switchboard is affected, since the exchange can still be swamped by incoming calls. This problem can be overcome to a certain extent by the computerised System X exchanges, which can be pre-programmed to select or reject specific groups of incoming or outgoing lines (17). Unfortunately, System X is itself particularly vulnerable to damage. A reliable source has informed the author that the entire Whitehall CBX went down during the 1987 hurricane, and that back-up systems failed to work properly.
The problem could be avoided by the use of EMSS. The system is installed, could be maintained, and could easily be extended by permanent connection to trunk lines and by providing lines to emergency services which are not presently connected. In many areas of the country there is existing spare trunk capacity for the first of these tasks.
If EMSS were backed-up by assured access to existing private lines (a simple wiring job) and by imaginative use of the cellular networks, the country could have, for very small expense, a great asset. The military planners would also benefit; their precious but unused system would be regularly tested and properly maintained.
References
- Confirmed by letter dated 9 Dec 87 from Ian Smith, Force Communications Officer, Thames Valley Police.
- Duncan Campbell,War Plan UK, Burnett 1982, p. 296.
- Letter dated 20 July 87 from M J Dudding, Shipping Policy & Emergency Planning Directorate, to local authorities. It is interesting to note that the (civil defence) Government Communications Network (GCN) has been renamed as the Emergency Communications Network or ECK
- The full details of TPS are contained in Cabinet Office General Notice GEN 74/87, issued on 1 November 1974.
- But not necessarily. Rest, refuge and casualty centres continue to be nominated and put on priority without the knowledge of their peacetime users. The same may apply, as was the case before 1987, to private industry.
- Head of Defence Division, British Telecom: letter dated 9 Sept. 88.
- According to a spokesperson for BT’s Defence Division in November 1988, the fines of authority have not changed with privatisation. The Government remains ‘our customer’ for GTPS, and final responsibility continues to lie with the Home Office Directorate of Telecommunications, with OFTEL playing ‘a role’.
- Telecom has ‘standby generators in all but the smallest of exchanges’. It also has a range of mobile generators varying in capacity from 10 to 600 kilowatts. Details are held on a ‘national register maintained on a closed user group on Prestel’ – D N Dick, Manager, BT Engineering & Technical Support Service: 1987 lecture to the Association of Civil Defence and Emergency Planning Officers.
- ‘Hurricane Havoc’, Civil Protection, Issue 51 Winter 1987, p. 4.
- According to the Joint Service Manual of Home Defence, JSP 349, Ministry of Defence, 1979, para 1310(d): Exchange batteries normally last for a maximum of 24 hours unless recharged. Even if the preference scheme was implemented battery life could be extended to only five days. There seems to be some discrepancy here between military theory and civilian practicalities.
- Reported to Chief Emergency Planning Officers’ course by ACC Hedges, Thames Valley Police, June 1988. Assistance confirmed by spokesperson for Racal Vodafone, November 1988.
- The British have come late to this one. Full details on NEMP are contained in Chapter 11 of Glasstone and Dolan’s The Effects of Nuclear Weapons (third edition published in the UK by Castle House, 1980). Five years later, the Final Report of the Working Party on Civil Defence Communications recommended ‘that the Directorate of Telecommunications, together with the Home Office Scientific Research and Development Branch, should continue with their own investigations into NEMP protection [and] that these investigations should be followed up, when practicable to do so, by the initiation of a firm work programme involving the hardening of emergency communications equipment.’ (Home Office, July 1985, para 82) (published January 1987). Protection systems currently approved by the Home Office for civil bunkers and the BT public exchanges are tested to NATO standard. This envisages a pulse from a tactical weapon exploded at a distance which allows for human survival typically two miles from ground zero.
At this point, the electromagnetic effects are considerably less than those from a high-yield high-altitude explosion. - There were two versions of ESS/1975. The first (typescript) edition carries the full text: the second (printed) has been edited to omit the italicised words.
- Letter dated 12 September 1984 from F H Elders, Defence Planning and Emergencies Branch, Department of the Environment and Department of Transport Common Services.
- Ministry of Defence, op cit, Pars 1311.
- John Cornwall, British Telecom Defence Division, speaking at Chief Emergency Planning Officers’ Society study, 26 October 1988.
- Telecom are planning the use of the 0800 ‘Linkline’ for calls to emergency centres. System X is able to extend this concept by programming for:
- Timelink – connecting to (eg) 12 offices during the day and one at night:
- Daylink – for instance to one office at the weekend:
- Arealink – routing calls to the nearest emergency centre:
- Distributionlink – routing to (eg) the largest available office:
- Commandlink – pre-programmed changes for (eg) more offices in bad weather.