Agenda and minutes

Apologies were received from County Councillor Peter Britcliffe. County Councillor John Singleton was in attendance as a substitute.

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 28 July 2021 be confirmed as a correct record and signed by the Chairman.

The Deputy Chief Fire Officer presented a detailed report to the Performance Committee.  This was the 1^st quarterly report for 2021/22 as detailed in the Integrated Risk Management Plan 2017-2022 and included an Annual Report in Road Safety Intervention Activity during 2020-21.

The Members were informed by the Deputy Chief Fire Officer, that the KPIs would be reviewed as part of the Community Risk Management Plan (CRMP) and a report would be brought to the Committee in due course. KPI 4 (Valuing Our People) was the main area to be strengthened as a number of indicators were reported to Her Majesty’s Inspector of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue Services (HMICFRS).

This quarter’s Four KPIs were shown in red which indicated that they were in negative exception. These were 1.3 Accidental Dwelling Fires (ADF); 2.3 Fire Engine Availability – Wholetime, Day crewing and Day Crewing Plus; 2.4 Fire Engine Availability – On Call Duty System; and 4.2.1 Staff Absence – Excluding On-Call Duty System.

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 was 31,862 and the previous year’s score was 32,448 meaning that the fire risk continued to reduce.

1.2       Overall Activity

This indicator measured the number of incidents that the Service attended with one or more pumping appliances.

Quarter 1 activity 4,867 previous year quarter 1 activity 4,916 a decrease of 1.00% over the same quarter of the previous year.

The Deputy Chief Fire Officer explained that it was expected the Service would respond to approximately 17,500 incidents over the year. There were also opportunities to support agencies such as the Police and North West Ambulance Service (NWAS). He highlighted to Members that there had been a peak in the number of incidents in April which had been a trend for the past three years. With the number of people outdoors increasing due to the start of spring, it could be a reason for the rise in the number of anti-social fires. The mean average should plateau during the year following the rise at the beginning of the year.

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 43% were false alarms. However, pleasingly the number of false alarms had reduced compared to the last report to the Performance Committee.

The Deputy Chief Fire Officer noted that the Service was currently consulting members of the public and broader stakeholders for their views on the proposed improvements  ...  view the full minutes text for item 9-20/21

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The Chairman agreed that the comparative performance report could be taken in Part 1 (the public part of the meeting) in view of the fact that all of the data within it was openly available. The Deputy Chief Fire Officer presented the April 2020 to March 2021 Comparative Performance Report to the meeting. Arrangements were in place within the old Best Value (BV) family group 4 to compile an annual comparative report in respect of the two (now withdrawn) national fire indicators.

The comparative fire and rescue service continued to comprise those which made up the old BV family group 4 as detailed in table 1 below:

TABLE 1 – COMPARATIVE FIRE & RESCUE SERVICES

Lancashire Fire and Rescue were high in levels of progress in reducing each of the indicators and performance had improved. The only area in which Lancashire was over the Family Group 4 average was in the number of primary fires per 100,000 population, which needed to be improved upon. Performance, on a whole, was better than the previous year.

The Deputy Chief Fire Officer informed that the information contained within the report was open to the public and was brought to committee once per year. The Services within the family group were very different and he proposed that he would bring something in the report for the broader KPIs from 2022 onwards that would allow members to consider if there was value within the Comparative Performance Report and whether to continue to bring the report to the Performance Committee. Councillor Beavers acknowledged the differences between the areas in the Family Group, however, she felt that the comparison was a good way of informing how well the Service was performing and the report should be kept, although, perhaps not with the same family.

RESOLVED :- That the Performance Committee noted the report and considered the comparative outcomes.

The next scheduled meeting of the Committee has been agreed for 10:00 hours on 15 December 2021 in Washington Hall, Service Training Centre, Euxton.

Further meetings are:          scheduled for 16 March 2022 and 29 June 2022

                                                proposed for 14 September 2022

The next meeting of the Committee would be held on 15 December 2021 at 10:00 hours in the Main Conference Room at Lancashire Fire and Rescue Service Headquarters, Fulwood.

Further meeting dates were noted for 16 March 2022 and agreed for 29 June 2022.