19th September 2026
There is a Government website that many people will never have heard of. Want to more then read on.
It is called Prepare
It does not look particularly alarming. There are no dramatic warnings on the front page and no suggestion that people should be building bunkers or filling their garages with supplies.
Instead, the message is remarkably simple: think ahead, make a plan and be prepared to cope if something goes wrong.
But the existence of the website is worth a closer look.
The Government is not just putting a few emergency tips online. It has now made household resilience part of a much wider national policy.
The question is why.
A different message from Government
The Prepare website asks people to consider how they would manage if an emergency affected their area.
It covers familiar problems such as flooding, storms, fires and power cuts, but also wider disruption. It recommends having important telephone numbers written down, knowing how to report a power cut, checking flood and weather warnings and considering what supplies might be needed if a household had to cope for several days.
It even suggests that households keep some non-perishable food, bottled water, a torch, a portable power bank and a battery or wind-up radio.
There is nothing particularly radical about any of that.
What is more significant is that the Government is now putting considerable effort into encouraging millions of households to think in these terms.
The Cabinet Office's 2026 Resilience Action Plan says the Government is developing a national public-engagement campaign around preparedness, with new advice for households and a multi-year campaign aimed at improving resilience.
This is a deliberate change in approach.
What is the Government worried about?
It would be wrong to interpret Prepare as evidence that the Government expects one particular disaster.
The official explanation is much broader.
The National Risk Register 2026 covers the most serious risks facing the United Kingdom. The Government says the risks have become more complex and interconnected, with issues ranging from severe weather and infrastructure failures to cyber attacks, geopolitical developments and other national-security threats.
The Cabinet Office describes resilience as a "whole of society" responsibility.
In other words, the Government, councils, emergency services, businesses, voluntary organisations and households all have a role.
That is an important change in emphasis.
It means that in a serious disruption the Government does not necessarily assume that normal services will continue exactly as they do on an ordinary day.
The power-cut example tells us quite a lot
Consider what happens during a prolonged electricity outage.
The advice is not simply to wait for the electricity company to restore the supply.
Households are encouraged to think about lighting, communications, food, water, medication and how they would keep in touch with other people.
The website even suggests talking to neighbours, exchanging contact details and considering who nearby might need additional help during an emergency.
That is really a message about community resilience.
It recognises that during a major disruption, public authorities cannot necessarily be everywhere at once.
For rural Scotland that is particularly relevant.
A power cut affecting a remote community in Caithness or Sutherland creates different problems from one affecting a densely populated urban neighbourhood.
Distances are greater.
Alternative services may be further away.
There may be fewer shops, fewer transport alternatives and fewer people available to provide immediate assistance.
And then there is the cost of living
This is where the Government's preparedness campaign becomes particularly interesting in the context of household finances.
A family does not need to experience a national emergency to discover that resilience matters.
A broken boiler can be an emergency.
A failed car can be an emergency.
A prolonged power cut can be an emergency.
So can a sudden large bill arriving when there is little money available.
The same basic principle applies in each case.
The more choices a household has, the easier it is to cope with an unexpected problem.
That means having some accessible savings if possible, keeping essential equipment working, avoiding unnecessary debt and knowing where help can be obtained.
It also means not leaving everything until the moment something goes wrong.
The Government is not saying "panic"
This distinction is important.
The Prepare website actually says that many of the recommended actions cost nothing and take only a few minutes. It also suggests building up an emergency kit gradually rather than buying everything at once.
That is sensible advice.
There is a danger that preparedness can become exaggerated into something resembling survivalism.
That is not what the Government is advocating.
It is saying something much more ordinary: be able to cope for a while if normal services are interrupted.
That could mean keeping a torch where it can be found in the dark, having a power bank for a mobile phone or knowing the telephone number for reporting a power cut.
It is hardly revolutionary.
But the fact that Government is now actively encouraging millions of people to do these things is significant.
The lessons of Covid are still influencing policy
The Government's resilience strategy is also partly a response to lessons from the Covid pandemic.
The UK Government's Resilience Action Plan says its approach builds on lessons from the Covid-19 Inquiry and the Grenfell Tower Inquiry. It acknowledges that the UK was not as prepared as it should have been for the pandemic.
The result is a much greater emphasis on preparation before a crisis rather than simply responding once it happens.
That is also why the Government has been developing a more detailed national risk assessment and a public campaign around preparedness.
Why this matters in the Highlands
For Highland communities, resilience has always been a practical issue.
Bad weather can disrupt roads.
Ferries and flights can be cancelled.
Power supplies can be interrupted.
A major accident can close an important route.
Flooding can isolate properties.
And a shortage of workers or a service closure can leave people travelling considerable distances to obtain an alternative.
The Highlands therefore already has something that Government policy is now trying to encourage more widely: a culture of managing with fewer immediate alternatives.
But there is another side to this.
Highland Council and NHS Highland are already under financial pressure.
If public services are being reorganised partly because governments are finding it increasingly difficult to meet rising demand, households and communities may gradually be expected to take more responsibility for their own resilience.
That does not necessarily mean Government abandoning its responsibilities.
But it does mean that self-reliance and community support are becoming more explicit parts of the national resilience strategy.
Is the Government covering its back?
That is perhaps the most interesting question. It would be too strong to say that the Prepare campaign proves the Government knows that a major crisis is coming.
There is no evidence for that.
But there is clear evidence that the Government believes the UK faces a more complicated risk environment and that households need to be better prepared for disruption. The 2026 Resilience Action Plan explicitly calls for a national public-engagement campaign and says households have a vital role in strengthening the country's resilience.
So perhaps the more accurate interpretation is this:
The Government is trying to make sure that if something does go wrong, the public is not completely dependent on the state to solve every problem immediately.
That is a reasonable objective.
But it also raises an important question.
If people are increasingly being encouraged to prepare themselves for disruption, what happens when the disruption is not caused by a flood, storm or power cut but by something much more ordinary?
Higher energy bills.
Higher council charges.
More expensive food.
Reduced public services.
Longer waits.
More expensive transport.
Or a combination of several of these at once.
That brings us back to the difficult period that may lie ahead.
The Government's message is essentially prepare for disruption.
For households, that may be good advice whether the disruption turns out to be a national emergency or simply another year in which the cost of running a home becomes harder to manage.
Perhaps the most sensible response is neither panic nor complacency.
It is simply to be a little better prepared than you were yesterday.
14 July 2026
The UK Government Resilience Action Plan: 2026 Implementation Report