Emergency 112

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Permalink Reply by Dick Harris on November 17, 2009 at 11:10

It's the invisible EU again!
112 was a well intentioned idea that first surfaced in the early 1990s and was imposed by “Council Decision of 29 July 1991 on the introduction of a single European emergency call number (91/396/EEC)”. As EU citizens could go anywhere freely, it seemed wise to ensure that calling the police or fire brigade should be possible without having to know the equivalent of 999 in whichever country you happened to be. The 1991 decision had plenty of flexibility but still had to be implemented by the end of 1996 at the latest. Today it is mandatory throughout the EU by virtue of article 26 of the Universal Service Directive which became binding in 2003.
Like many good and apparently simple ideas, 112, turned out to be quite hard to implement. Not so much in the UK where we already had a single emergency number (if you dial 112 your call lands up in the same place as if you had dialled 999). The main problem is how to handle the calls once they have been answered and new arrangements were needed in countries that didn't already have a single emergency number - which was most of them.
The recent news item that may have brought this to your attention was probably made because one of the two most recent EU states, Bulgaria, finally managed to introduce this dialling code - which they should have done before their accession in 2007. Bulgaria's compliance evidently means that 112 now works in all 27 member states.

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Permalink Reply by StephenBln on November 17, 2009 at 13:58

Here in Germany, 112 has been the emergency number for the fire service and ambulance services as long as I've lived here... (1982) The police are 110, although both numbers are closely linked.

Perhaps OT here, but another thing that (IMO) that should be harmonised EU wide are electric plugs and sockets.. and perhaps a standard height for light switches.. although the Brits are generally shorter than Germans, the light switches in the UK are always much higher up the wall.. and when I'm in the UK, I always tap on the wrong spot..

Would make life much easier, although the Brits are sure not to be happy with such a ruling, because their ugly, much too big sockets, would no doubt, not be acceptable anywhere else... :o)

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Permalink Reply by John D on November 17, 2009 at 16:08

The UK ring main system is more economical, in terms of wiring, and more flexible than Continental star systems and the individually fused plugtops, where you can select the fuse rating to suit the appliance, is safer.

Hands off !! :-)

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Permalink Reply by Old-Age-Emporium(OAE) on November 17, 2009 at 15:20

So if I ring 112 I don't have to wait for an ambulance from Sofia or Bucharest to get me to the Whittington (or Royal Free Dick as it'll soon be known)? Had me worried there for a moment.

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Permalink Reply by Dick Harris on November 19, 2009 at 11:52

That's right. Moreover, this code doesn't solve the language problem so if a Bulgarian here calls 112 he would still need to speak English.

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