Agenda and minutes

The Chairman, County Councillor Holgate welcomed Authority Members and members of the press and public to the virtual committee meeting of the Lancashire Combined Fire Authority.  He advised that in response to the Covid-19 Pandemic the Government had made regulations that enabled virtual meetings.  This meeting was accessible for Committee Members via Microsoft Teams and for members of the press and public via a live webcast on YouTube.

A roll call was undertaken and Members individually confirmed their attendance.

None received.

Members are asked to consider any pecuniary/non-pecuniary interests they may have to disclose to the meeting in relation to matters under consideration on the agenda.

None received.

RESOLVED: - That the Minutes of the last meeting held on the 16 December 2020 be confirmed as a correct record for signature by the Chairman.

The Deputy Chief Fire Officer was pleased to present a positive report.  This was the 3rd quarterly report for 2020/21 as detailed in the Risk Management Plan 2017-2022.  He proposed that at the end of the performance year a report be brought to the next Committee meeting to look at making small changes to the key performance indicators (delivering value for money and valuing people) to better align with data returns submitted to Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue Services.

Members examined each indicator in turn as follows:

KPI 1 – Preventing, fires and other emergencies from happening and Protecting, people and property when fires happen

1.1       Risk Map

This indicator measured the fire risk in each Super Output Area.  Risk was determined using fire activity over the previous 3 fiscal years along with a range of demographic data, such as population and deprivation.

The standard was to reduce the risk in Lancashire – an annual reduction in the County risk map score.

The current score 32,448, previous year score 31,816.

1.2       Overall Activity

This indicator measured the number of incidents that the Service attended with one or more pumping appliances. The Deputy Chief Fire Officer advised that the number of incidents attended included work undertaken with other emergency services particularly the Police and North West Ambulance Service.  An increase in number of incidents attended was not therefore negative if the Service was supporting other blue light colleagues. 

Quarter 3 activity 4,109, previous year quarter 3 activity 4,281 a decrease of 4.02% over the same quarter.

Incidents attended consisted of a myriad of different types.  The report presented a chart which represented the count and percentage that each activity had contributed to the overall quarter’s activity; most notably was that 51% were false alarms.

As agreed at the last meeting, proposals for changes to the Unwanted Fire Signals Policy would be considered as a separate item later on the agenda.

1.3      Accidental Dwelling Fires

This indicator reported the number of primary fires where a dwelling had been affected and the cause of the fire had been recorded as 'Accidental' or 'Not known'.

It was noted that quarter 3 activity was 231, the previous year quarter 3 activity was 206, which represented an increaseof 12.1% over the same quarter.  Year to date performance was 654 compared with 615 the previous year.

The Deputy Chief Fire Officer advised that there had been an increase in Accidental Dwelling Fire incident numbers in the last quarter which could be due to lockdown.  Circa 50% of activity was kitchen fires and corporate communications colleagues were increasing safety messaging to raise awareness.

1.3.1   Accidental Dwelling Fires – Extent of Damage (Fire Severity)

The Deputy Chief Fire Officer advised this indicator set out the damage which had occurred from Accidental Dwelling Fire incidents.  He was pleased to report that whilst incident numbers remained fairly static the level of damage sustained was reducing due to proactive work including community safety and smoke alarm ownership.  ...  view the full minutes text for item 44/19

The Deputy Chief Fire Officer introduced the report.  He drew Members attention to the overall activity breakdown detailed earlier on the agenda which showed that 51% of incidents were due to automatic fire alarm activations.  He advised that if attendance was discounted for support given to Police and North West Ambulance Service colleagues (for gaining entry, support to missing persons searches and other activities) the overall activity breakdown to automatic fire alarm activations would increase to around 54% and it was known from statistical analysis that around 99% of those activations would be false alarm calls.  He also took the opportunity to re-emphasize the inspectorate scrutiny in this area. 

Members received a presentation from Area Manager Jon Charters and Area Manager Mark Hutton that provided an overview of the current policy pertaining to Automatic Fire Alarm (AFA) actuations (in particular, those categorised as Unwanted Fire Signals) and proposals for policy change.

The presentation focussed on system-based actuations and attendances made where the Service could work with premises owners to eradicate and reduce actuations as opposed to well-intended actuations from people who reasonably believed there was a fire and activated the fire alarm system or malicious calls (which represented a small proportion of calls and were dealt with very differently). 

The current AFA policy had been in place since April 2016.  It i) set out the impact and risks associated with Unwanted Fire Signals (UWFS); ii) defined what constituted an UWFS; iii) defined the role of Alarm Receiving Centres (ARCs); iv) defined the call handling role within North West Fire Control; v) confirmed the information gathering role of Operational Crews; vi) correctly categorised the incident and populated the Incident Recording System; vii) confirmed that Lancashire Fire and Rescue Service (LFRS) did not reset Fire Alarms; viii) set trigger points for Fire Protection staff intervention; and ix) set out a proportionate enforcement route which started with the provision of business support and escalated to formal enforcement action to resolve unsatisfactory premises.

It was noted that LFRS continued to attend much higher volumes of AFA actuations than many other fire and rescue services, as noted by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue Services during its first inspection.  In 2020, LFRS attended 4,851 AFA’s of which 63% were in sleeping risk premises and 37% in non-sleeping risk premises.

At the present time, LFRS was distinctly out of step with the approaches currently being employed by the other Services operating within North West Fire Control, who had taken a risk-based approach to reducing mobilisations to AFA’s, typically framed around building types and/or time of day or night.

LFRS’ current approach posed a number of challenges to the Service:

•   Diverted essential resources from actual emergencies;

•   Created risk to crew and public whilst responding;

•   Disrupted Community and Business Safety activities;

•   Created disruption for businesses employing on-call firefighters;

•   Reduced operational training time and impacted upon planned exercises;

•   Created environmental impact;

•   Constituted a draw upon public finances; and  ...  view the full minutes text for item 45/19

The Deputy Chief Fire Officer introduced Road Safety Coordinator, Rhiannon Leeds who presented the report and accompanying presentation to provide Members with an update on the work of the Lancashire Road Safety Partnership (LRSP).

The Road Safety Partnership for Lancashire was set up in 2001 initially as the co-ordinating body for all the speed cameras.  Very quickly an education and engagement division of the Partnership was established and there had been a lot of changes since then.

The partnership comprised of: Lancashire Fire & Rescue Service, Lancashire Constabulary, North West Ambulance Service, Lancashire County Council, Blackburn with Darwen Council, Blackpool Council, Highways England and the Police and Crime Commissioner.  Working together to reduce duplication, the partnership aimed to reduce road casualties through the management of speed, enforcement, engineering, emergency response, driver education and training and through developing collaborative approaches to education, awareness, engagement and other measures. Everything the Partnership did was based on casualty, collision and police data in order to target some of the most vulnerable road user groups.

In 2010 the funding model for partnerships changed and local authorities did not receive government grant for road safety.  Since 2010 there had been a small year on year rise in people killed or seriously injured on Lancashire’s roads.  In 2013/14, Lancashire County Council Scrutiny Panel told the Road Safety Partnership to make improvements to address the lack of a purposeful strategy, meaningful analysis, coordination and duplication of effort.  The Partnership then identified: the right people for the right roles, a clear, long-term strategy alongside short-term tactical needs, issues with realistic and evidence-based options and tactics in order to be effective.

Rhiannon Leeds gave examples where processes had improved that resulted in clear, targeted messages and consistent responses to queries raised in different areas of Lancashire.  Over the last 12-18 months an online tool for members of the public to report concerns had been implemented.  This looked at speed, casualty and collision data to enable a fair and consistent policy to be applied across the county.

All the LRSP partners were committed to working together to reduce casualties on Lancashire’s roads and make people feel safe.  Some of the partnership activities were noted as:

·         Child pedestrian training at reception, year 1 and year 2 at almost every primary school in the county;

·         Cycle training at primary school age;

·         Targeted social media campaigns based on the ‘fatal 5’;

·         Activity in communities at key times of the year in line with the national road safety calendar;

·         Managing and responding to community speed concerns county wide;

·         Delivery of speed awareness courses (and other educational courses as an alternative to prosecution);

·         Coordinated safety engineering and enforcement works such as the installation of average speed cameras;

·         Delivery of RoadSense to Year 6;

·         Delivery of Safe Drive Safe Alive.

A reporting structure was presented which incorporated the 3 local authorities, 14 districts and policing divisions across the county.  The Local Road Safety Partnership was governed by an Executive Board which was chaired by the Assistant Chief Constable.  ...  view the full minutes text for item 46/19

The next scheduled meeting of the Committee has been agreed for 10:00 hours on 30 June 2021 - venue to be agreed.

Further meetings are:    scheduled for 15 September 2021 and 15 December 2021

                                           proposed for 16 March 2022

The next meeting of the Committee would be held on 30 June 2021 - venue to be agreed.

Further meeting dates were noted for 15 September 2021 and 15 December 2021 and agreed for 16 March 2022.