While a prolonged period of severe wintry weather could leave the island vulnerable, the DoI Minister says the workforce can cope with most Manx weather events.
Dr Michelle Haywood was asked by Onchan MHK Julie Edge how many employees are available to be deployed if the island has a period of
icy conditions?
The Minister said that in total there are 75 employees for such events, made up of “30 experienced and fully trained winter service operators who can operate the department’s gritter fleet”.
The other 45 are people who can be deployed to fill salt bins, close roads, remove snow, carry out localized gritting and other emergency responses as needed.
She added that the DoI works with other sections of government and local authorities to bolster this resource and to deal with localised icy conditions such as such as in and around schools in retail areas and hospitals.
Sufficient?
Asked by Ms Edge, Dr Haywood confirmed that the number of workers has dropped in recent years.
However, she added: “In 2014 the department estimated that it required a minimum staffing level of 110 in order to operate properly at this level, and current resources are significantly below this.
“This does leave the department and the island vulnerable in the sustained weather event.
“However, most of the weather that we have to deal with is fairly short lived, and at that point, we do step up our staff, and they do step up to respond, as we have seen in recent events.”
Plough?
Responding to a supplementary from Jason Moorhouse (Arbory, Castletown and Malew), Dr Haywood said she doesn’t know if the DoI owns a snowplough, but would find out.
Asked about numbers by Chris Thomas (Douglas Central), Dr Haywood said: “I think it’s helpful here to consider what happens when there is a developing weather event in that the Met Office predictions are very often fairly accurate several days in advance.
“Preparation takes place in planning in advance of that weather forecast or the weather warnings that are issued if the event is predicted to happen outside of normal operating hours or for more than 24 hours, we move to a shift pattern to allow the number of hours that each member of staff is working to be limited and to allow rest time between their shifts, and that’s important for their health and wellbeing.
“If it is an out of hours response, we have a minimum of two standby teams on rota on rota on a weekly basis to deal with emergency calls out of hours, and that includes the highways, issues of snow and ice.”
The Minister also confirmed that residents are able to report empty salt bins after concerns were raised by Ms Edge that some bins were left empty during a recent period of ice and snow.
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