Agenda item

To consider Item 6

The Corporate Planning Manager advised Members that this was the report on the outcomes of the ‘listening and engagement’ CRMP consultation carried out with members of the public in June. Consultation at this very early stage in the CRMP development process was to comply with National Framework and new Fire Standard requirements and also, very importantly, the Gunning Principles.

Officers pay particular attention to these as they set out four legal tests that define what a legitimate consultation looks like, including: that proposals are consulted on when they are still at a formative stage to ensure that decisions had not been subject to pre-determination; and, that there was sufficient information to enable intelligent consideration resulting in an informed response. These requirements tend to favour qualitative methods of consultation and engagement when dealing with complex issues, hence the use of independently and expertly facilitated focus groups that allow participants to reflect in depth about the issues, and to receive and question relevant information.

Also worth noting was the effort that Opinion Research Services (ORS) go to recruit a diverse and representative sample of the public. Members would see the effects of this from the statistics in the report, and as a result of this, ORS advise that the outcomes of the consultation were broadly indicative of how the public at large would incline if the Service was able to engage with a much larger proportion of the population in this way.

The Corporate Planning Manager advised Members that the consultation was structured into two main parts. Firstly, an exploration of the participants perceptions of risk in their communities and also how they see the Service and their awareness of what it does. As with previous consultations of this type, fire was seldom mentioned spontaneously as something that the participants worry about even though they know that the consultation had been commissioned by the fire and rescue service. However, there was a good exploration of perceptions of some currently topical issues such as wildfire and lithium-ion battery risks.

In the second part, it starts to explore some of the challenges the Service faces and some potential ways it might respond to them. These included key issues raised by the HMICFRS in their Round 2 inspection report such as: the future of on-call service; automatic fire alarms; and workforce diversity.

A Member felt it was important to take note of the views and comments around diversity and how the Service connects with various communities to show that the fire service is a place for them.

A Members asked if the consultation was reaching enough of the population within Buckinghamshire and Milton Keynes.

The Corporate Planning Manager advised that ORS were reasonably confident it had engaged with a broad selection of the public, which well represented a larger selection of the public. When consulting on the draft plan, the focus groups may be rerun, there would be an online facility for anyone to respond, and a social media campaign, to make everyone aware of the consultation and encourage participation. There had also been a staff consultation.

RESOLVED –

That the report be submitted to 11 October 2023 Fire Authority meeting for information and noting.