it is the single plan that all agencies and responders work to. resource request task plan incident report history pre-1990s despite having had a national fire service since 1976, and a national police force since the late 19th century, there was no consistency in the management of the response to emergencies. each agency had its own communication system, jargon, hierarchy and attitude towards a particular type of emergency. development of cims was also indirectly influenced by a major review of new zealand's emergency services, which took place in the mid-1990s. this review recommended that agencies should look at working closer together, in order to provide a more integrated service to new zealand communities. example of issue road-vehicle crashes that do not involve fire show how confusion could arise. the fire service act 1975 grants authority to the new zealand fire service for fires, as well as all other emergencies where it feels it can render assistance. the police, however, have a common-law duty to protect life and property, as well as statutory enforcement authority of transport legislation. likewise, the local ambulance service may feel it has primary responsibility, because it is responsible for the well-being of anyone injured by the incident. with each agency thinking that it is in charge, effective co-ordination may become difficult. 1996: cims conceived in 1996, the new zealand fire service began to promote the idea of implementing an incident management system that was common across all emergency response and management agencies. in march 1997, a workshop of 25 representatives from the new zealand police, new zealand fire service, the national rural fire authority, new zealand ambulance board, civil defence, local government, new zealand defence force, new zealand forest owners association and the department of conservation was held. this initial workshop developed the vision, mission and project scope. since then, the system, nationwide training using consistent training materials and the system's implementation have been carried out. nationally consistent training by 1998, much of the system was developed. two levels of training were decided upon, at awareness and practitioner levels. training was develivered through the nzqa's national qualifications framework, with the fire & rescue services industry training organisation (fristo) nominated as the standards setting body and holding authority for national moderation. one unique element of cims, is that the practitioner level programmes must be delivered in a multi-agency environment. co-ordination between the emergency services as well as training individual responders, a wider level of co-ordination between the emergency services was required in order for new zealand's emergency services to develop towards the model of comprehensive emergency management, as envisaged by the 1995 civil defence emergency management review. during the late 1990s, territorial authorities aligned to form emergency management groups (now known as civil defence emergency management groups), in anticipation of legislative change promoting a move away from purely response-focused planning. in addition to efforts by local government, emergency services coordination committees were established to enhance operational effectiveness, clarify local capabilities and establish lead agencies for circumstances where statutory authority was unclear, as in the example above. two examples of committees that remain in existence include those in the counties-manukau and central hawkes bay areas. cims reviewed 2014 the second edition of cims builds on the first by incorporating experience gained since 1998. in particular, it reflects the lessons identified from the responses to a number of large-scale and complex emergencies that occurred in new zealand from 2010 to 2012. these emergencies emphasised the importance of cims, but also subjected the system to new levels of examination, and identified areas where it needs strengthening. accordingly, this edition of cims also gives effect to recommendations from formal reviews and inquiries into those emergency responses, including: the royal commission on the pike river coal mine tragedy the independent review of the civil defence emergency management response to the 22 february 2011 christchurch earthquake the canterbury earthquakes royal commission the independent review of maritime new zealand's response to the mv rena incident on 5 october 2011; and the ctv building coronial inquest (22 february 2011 christchurch earthquake) this revised cims establishes a modular and scalable framework for consistent response at any level – from a small, single agency response to a larger, multi-agency response that may require co-ordination at the community or incident level or higher. cims enables agencies to plan for, train and conduct responses in a consistent manner, without being prescriptive. with this approach cims is an essential tool in new zealand's preparedness to effectively respond to emergencies. current use cims using organisations cims is to be used by all emergency services, government agencies and management agencies, including those agencies involved in the 2012-2014 review: ambulance new zealand (st john new zealand; wellington free ambulance) department of conservation department of the prime minister and cabinet maritime new zealand ministry for primary industries ministry of civil defence & emergency management ministry of health ministry of social development new zealand customs service new zealand defence force fire and emergency new zealand new zealand police ministry of business, innovation and employment participated in 2013 for the purpose of developing an underground mines emergency protocol business continuity/crisis management in recent years, cims has also been recognised as best practice for implementing management structures for response and recovery. many organisations outside those identified above are now adopting cims - including lifeline utilities, universities, and businesses. the key benefits are adopting a recognised standard, and being able to interoperate with other agencies during response to complex events that involve more than one agency. land search and rescue new zealand land search and rescue inc (landsar) has widely adopted the use of cims. access to cims training and education training is provided by a number of public sector, commercial organisations and nzqa private training establishments. cims 2 is widely available from a number of vendors. cims 4 can only be delivered as a multi-agency course - usually led in rotation by police, fire, ambulance or the local civil defence emergency management (cdem) authority. for more information, contact your local civil defence emergency management authority for more information. cims training is registered on the national qualifications framework, run by the new zealand qualifications authority. nzqa unit standard 17279 (level 2, 2 credits) - demonstrate knowledge of the co-ordinated incident management system (cims). nzqa unit standard 22445 (level 4, 4 credits) - describe the roles and functions of a cims incident management team (imt) at an incident. more in-depth study into concepts of incident management is available from massey university in a third-year paper on incident command systems 130301.