London companies not prepared for terrorist incident

Many companies remain under-prepared for a terrorist attack in London, England according to a Marsh survey. Roughly one-third of 80 delegates attending a Marsh seminar on terrorism, representing large and mid-size firms in the Greater London area, noted they did not have emergency response, crisis management and business recovery plans integrated within their business continuity management (BCM) framework. Similarly, they did not have a risk management strategy for dealing with a terrorist attack. “We urge all London businesses to review their BCM plans and processes to ensure they are equipped to respond to a terrorist incident,” Antony Ketteridge, a business risk consultant at Marsh, said in a release. “While there is little businesses can do to prevent a terrorist attack, much can be done to mitigate its impact by forming robust BCM plans, running exercises to rehearse their effectiveness, and managing the risk in their supply chain, or understanding the insurance implications.”Private insurers in Canada don’t offer stand-alone terrorism insurance coverage, although the risk is no less prevalent. For example, a court case is now underway in Brampton involving the 2006 arrest of 18 adults and youth alleged to be involved in a homegrown terror cell. According to the Crown’s arguments in court, as reported by TheStar.com, the cell was allegedly plotting an attack that would be much greater in scale than the 2005 bombings in London, which killed 52 people.