Cabinet Office Briefing Rooms

The facility

The Cabinet Office Briefing Rooms are a group of meeting rooms in the Cabinet Office at 70 Whitehall in London, often used for different committees which co-ordinate the actions of bodies within the Government of the United Kingdom in response to instances of national or regional crisis, or during events abroad with major implications for the UK. It is often referred to as COBRA, although this is not an official term. The reason for the different titles is unclear; it may have been confused with other meeting rooms in the Cabinet Office which are not part of the COBR facility.

A single photo of one of the rooms in COBR was released in 2010 in response to a Freedom of Information Act request.

The committees

The composition of a Cobra meeting depends on the nature of the situation.

The Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE) is a sub-committee of COBR.

The events

COBR meetings were created in the 1970s following the government's response to the 1972 miners' strike. The first COBR meeting then took place during the Munich massacre in the summer of 1972. Other events that have led to meetings being convened include the 1980 Iranian Embassy siege, the September 11 attacks, the July 2015 presence of migrants in and around Calais, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the 2024 United Kingdom riots.

Criticisms

In 2009, former senior police officer Andy Hayman, who sat on a committee after the 7 July 2005 London bombings and at other intervals from 2005 to 2007, was highly critical of its "cumbersome, bureaucratic and overly political" workings in his book The Terrorist Hunters.

References

References

1. (26 January 2010). "The Home Office's Response to Terrorist Attacks". The Stationery Office.
2. Mason, Chris. (23 July 2012). "London 2012: What exactly is a Cobra meeting?". [[BBC News]].
3. (23 January 2020). "COBR (COBRA)".
4. (12 November 2010). "COBR – a Freedom of Information request to Cabinet Office". WhatDoTheyKnow.
5. Gardiner, Joey. (21 October 2002). "What is Cobra". The Guardian.
6. (23 April 2020). "Publishing Sage membership would 'increase public confidence' in government, agrees Whitty". The Independent.
7. "File 9: Central Government in War in the 1980s".
8. (1989). "Coal, Crisis, and Conflict: The 1984–85 Miners' Strike in Yorkshire". Manchester University Press.
9. "COBR (COBRA)". [[Institute for Government]].
10. (31 July 2015). "Britain calls emergency meeting on Calais migrants". Deutsche Welle.
11. (9 March 2020). "Coronavirus: UK to remain in 'containment' phase of response".
12. (4 August 2024). "No 10 to hold emergency Cobra meeting after weekend of violence".
13. O'Neil, Sean. (22 June 2009). "Cobra emergency committee 'slows everything down'". The Times.