Lloyd’s panelists discuss businesses' role in mitigating terrorism risks

Global businesses must do more to prepare for changing terrorism and political violence risks, warned speakers at a Lloyd’s debate on terrorism earlier this week. The event, entitled ‘Global business: under attack?’ – brought together leading experts including Sir Richard Mottram, Permanent Secretary, Intelligence, Security and Resilience at the Cabinet Office, and former Head of MI6 Sir Richard Dearlove.

Lloyds’s report of the debate reads as follows (verbatim):

Introducing the debate, Chairman of Lloyd’s Lord Levene said: “There appears to be a significant gap between a growing risk awareness and tangible action actually taken by many companies, driven by a lack of understanding of the dynamics they encounter as they globalise.”

This lack of understanding was also highlighted by Peter Clarke, deputy assistant commissioner for the Metropolitan Police, who called for greater emphasis on the security of business’ premises. He said too few companies had taken into account the amount of information about their business that is available via open sources, such as the Internet.

“How much detail of your business that could be relevant to hostile reconnaissance is open to public research?” he said. “I suggest more than most of us would recognise.”

The need to create a business strategy to deal with the threat of attacks was backed up by Sir Richard Dearlove, who is now the chairman of Ascot Underwriting. He referred to terrorism as “an extreme act of political communication”.

Closing the event, Sir Richard Mottram emphasised that the UK Government had a clear strategy in place, and wanted to work closely with the business community to deliver it. He said: “Terrorism is not the greatest threat to us, but it is the greatest security threat. The issue is how to persuade people not to go down this route. We have to recognise we are engaged in a battle of ideas; this is an ideological struggle.”

This issue of home grown terrorism was cited by an overwhelming 98 percent of audience members as “a significant emerging threat to British businesses”. In a major acknowledgement of the insurance industry, 95 percent also said they believe Lloyd’s can play “a valuable role in facilitating debate on major risk issues”.

Video highlights of the event will be available at www.lloyds.com/360project by the end of May.

•Date: 18th May 2007 • Region: UK •Type: Article •Topic: Terrorism
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