Lancashire Combined Fire Authority
Resources Committee
Meeting to be held 3 July 2024
(Appendix A refers)
Contact for further information:
Steven Brown - Director of Corporate Services – Telephone Number 01772 826804
Executive Summary
This report sets out the Productivity and Efficiency Plan for 2024/25. Recommendation
The Committee is asked to note the report.
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Information
As part of the Spending Review 2021, the National Fire Chiefs Council (NFCC) and the Local Government Association (LGA) agreed that between 2022/23-2024/25, fire and rescue services in England would increase wholetime firefighter productivity by 3% and create 2% of non-pay efficiency savings. Linked to these targets, the Minister of State for Crime, Policing and Fire asked that all standalone Fire and Rescue Authorities (FRAs) draft and publish Productivity and Efficiency Plans. A plan was produced for 2023/24, the information provides a strong evidence base for the next Spending Review and demonstrates positive leadership from the sector to engage with the productivity and efficiency agenda.
For 2024/25, the Minister has again requested that all FRAs, publish a Productivity and Efficiency Plan for 2024/25 to help the Home Office, NFCC and LGA to build a more comprehensive picture on the sector’s progress against the agreed targets and savings achieved.
Guidance has been provided by the Home Office setting out the information that must be contained in the statements; providing primary information about the Authority, detailed of efficiencies and productivity measures achieved to date and planned. The guidance provided three examples from FRAs of well written plans from 2023/24 of which Lancashire was one of the good practice examples.
The 2024/25 plan follows the same format as the previous year. It shows that compared to the Government Spending Review non-pay efficiency savings target for fire authorities of 2%, the LCFA achieved 5.6% on average over the period.
Productivity improvements in aspects of Prevention and Protection activity have also been achieved; from 22,375 combined Home Fire Safety Checks and Business Fire Safety Checks in 2022/23, to 24,393 in 2023/24.
The plan sets out many other efficiency and productivity activities and is accessible on the website and attached as Appendix A to this report.
Financial Implications
As outlined in the report
Legal Implications
None
Business Risk Implications
None
Environmental Impact
None
Equality and Diversity Implications
None
Human Resource Implications
None
Local Government (Access to Information) Act 1985
List of background papers
Paper:
Date:
Contact:
Reason for inclusion in Part 2 if appropriate: N/a
Appendix A: Productivity and Efficiency Plan 2024/25