Agenda item

To consider Item 7

The Head of Technology, Transformation and PMO advised Members that there had been one new measure added in the response section, which was there was now site specific risk information (SSRI) high-risk sites completion rate and the following work in progress measure had been populated. In the public value sector, percentage of compliance and standing orders relating to contracts. All other work in progress measures would be populated by the end of the financial year.

The Data Intelligence Team Manager firstly apologised to Members that in the printed copy, some of the ‘monitoring measures’ did not show on the report but could be seen on the soft copy.  Also, there was an individual page in front of Members, to correct an error on the printed copy, that was now updated.

The Data Intelligence Team Manger advised Members that the Key Performance Measures report helps the Service understand how it was performing. It also enabled certain measures to be highlighted to Members and staff. Based on feedback from quarter one, an additional page had been added which reflected on the previous quarters highlighted measures. Reading the summary pages, Members might feel that there were many measures showing outcomes not in line with expectations and targets. It was worth remembering, that during this reporting period, the Service experienced two heat waves that saw extreme demand.

The Data Intelligence Team Manager advised Members that there was only one highlight measure in Q2 – Public Impact: Average attendance time to all incidents. This identified how the Service’s average attendance time to all incidents had increased from being within three seconds on previous years in Q1 to being 36 seconds slower than the previous years. The above was a common theme across a number of measures, most of which would be covered within the Summer Pressures final report.

A Member asked regarding the people measures and the high response rate through the summer fires, and the difficulty of recruiting On Call firefighters, which was also reflected within the HMICFRS report. Had the Service moved further forward with this, in the narrative it doesn’t mention these stations, that while they were operational they were not always crewed. Would this change the figures?

The Head of Prevention, Response and Resilience advised that On Call recruitment had been a challenge for a number of years, and there was a focus on recruitment for On Call Stations, but there was limited success in terms of daily availability. Early data coming out of the heat wave in the Summer indicated that resilience was very effective and there were a lot of additional appliances on the run during the heatwave. It could be done, but it was getting the resilience guaranteed.

A Member asked regarding the Compliments, Complaints and Concerns, there were four complaints and one compliment for September, was there any narrative to it.

The Director of Legal and Governance would provide the detail. The annual report had just been presented to the Overview and Audit Committee last week. There was a very robust procedure for complaints and every one was investigated, not all were upheld.

The Chairman asked if the trend against previous years could also be included and an extraction of the upheld measure as well.

A Member asked why appraisal completion and completion of mandatory learning packages was low. If it was mandatory, why was it not being completed.

The Head of Technology, Transformation and PMO advised Members in the absence of the Head of Protection, Assurance and Development, that appraisal completion continued to be monitored and championed, but she would ask him to provide Members with more details in terms of completion of appraisals.

The Head of Prevention, Response and Resilience advised that the system previously updated Managers and staff with what was outstanding, but it had stopped sending reminders. This was being worked on and hopefully Members would see an increase in appraisals undertaken in future reports.

The Chairman asked that in the next report could Officers provide more detail on the actions being taken on appraisal completion and completion of mandatory learning packages.

The Chairman asked about confidence around the fire and wellness visits improving in Q3 and Q4 and what the outcome would look like against the measures in the report.

The Head of Prevention, Response and Resilience advised that there had been a lot of recruitment within the Prevention Team this year and there was also an onboarding process of training which took around six months, so there was some delay in getting the output required. With the rewritten Prevention Strategy and the Prevention Improvement Plan which was now making good progress. The coordination across stations to increase the amount of fire and wellness visits they were undertaking was working really well. It was hoped that the numbers would be increased by the end of this financial year.

The Chairman asked around the Internal Audit overdue audit actions which seemed to be on a worsening trend and how it was getting back on track.

The Director of Finance and Assets advised that there were a number of outstanding actions which were monitored by the Overview and Audit Committee. This report does not go into detail as to what was high, medium or low priority. There were a lot of actions listed separately but would be resolved by one action. For example, the Procurement Strategy to be presented at the Fire Authority meeting in December, would take off six of those actions.

The Chairman felt it would be helpful to have the carbon emissions and recycling measures in place and it would be helpful to have a target date.

The Chairman advised that officers were sharing the highlighted measures with Members, largely those measures that were of concern or impact, but it would also give Members assurance to see those measures that were going really well because the Service should also celebrate success.

The Director of Finance and Assets advised Members that with regard to the carbon emissions and recycling measures within the Climate Action Plan, there were a number of actions for each financial year. One of the actions for this current financial year was to look at baseline of carbon emissions. The target date was the end of this financial year and would be the baseline going forward.

RESOLVED –

That the BFRS Performance for Q2 2022/23 is noted.

All Officers left the meeting apart from the Chief Fire Officer, Head of Human Resources and the Democratic Services Officer.