Agenda item

Area

Overspend/ (Under spend) to 31 July

Forecast Outturn at 31 March

Reason

£’000

£’000

Winter Hill

110

110

Cost agreed to date was £750k, however it was noted that all invoices had not yet been received in relation to the incident (including those from FRS who assisted) and as such we cannot accurately predict the final total cost.

As this incident was covered by the Bellwin Scheme of Emergency Financial Assistance we would be making a claim under this and hence our total net costs should be limited to the threshold £110k.

The Committee would be updated on final costs, once all claims had been received.

Fleet Services

38

72

Further to a discussion at the last meeting, the numbers ordered and potential costs of new hydrant installations over the last few years had been:

Year

Number

Cost

1516

88

£77k

1617

81

£71k

1718

99

£87k

Historically these costs could take years from initial notification and calculation to the actual build completion, but the recent increase in new housing was having an impact on the budget.  We were currently working with local planning offices to review options relating to these costs and the potential for housing developers to meet these.

Property

109

104

The overspend position related to premises repairs and maintenance. The forecast overspend reflected some of the new minor schemes approved in year to enhance station facilities such as enhanced female facilities.

Wholetime Pay

(48)

(300)

The following issues affected whole-time pay:

·      The budget allowed for an assumed 2% pay award last year, however to date no agreement had been reached on this, other than an interim 1%. Hence in the first four months of the year there had been an underspend of £100k. It was not clear whether this position would change or whether this had now been superseded by the 2018 pay award negotiations that were on-going. Should the position continue for the remainder of the year the total over provision within the budget would be £300k, which was reflected in the forecast shown

·      The budget also allowed for an assumed 2% pay-award for July 2018. Members noted that the Union and Employers Side had still been unable to reach an agreement on pay awards at the present time, hence the current underspend included £50k which related to the outstanding pay award. For the purpose of forecasting we had assumed that this would be agreed at 2%, backdated to July 2018, and had therefore allowed for a cost of £450k in the outturn position.

·      In order to maintain pump availability at key RDS stations we had continued to detach in wholetime personnel, with over 800 detachments taking place in the first part of the year. Where there were insufficient staff available to enable detachments to take place, the shortfall was met by overtime. In the year to date we had incurred £50k of overtime at key RDS stations, with the most significant costs incurred at Wesham, Preesall, Longridge and Garstang. (Detachments did not have an actual staff cost associated with them as they were undertaken by personnel on duty, although travel time may be claimable. However based on the numbers undertaken in the year to date this equated to a notional cost of approx. £100k.)

·      As in previous years the budget included a vacancy factor based on anticipated retirements, leavers and new recruits. During the first four months staffing numbers had been higher than forecast, due to fewer retirements (there were currently 6 personnel who were forecast to retire but had not yet done so) resulting in an overspend of approx. £80k for the first part of the year. It was impossible to accurately predict this going forward, but should this position continue throughout the year the total additional costs of maintaining 6 extra posts was £240k.

·      The budget also allowed for the recruitment of 12 FF apprentices in year, at a cost of £200k. Given the difficulty in establishing a suitable apprentice’s scheme, as previously reported, it was clear that these would not be recruited until next year, and hence no costs would be incurred.

Control Staff

-

-

The budget had been amended to reflect the fact that whilst we employed two Control Staff, one had been seconded to work for the Home Office on the national ESMCP project.

Hence the amended budget was in a breakeven position.

Retained (RDS) Pay

124

250

The following issues affected retained pay:

·      As referred to under whole-time pay the budget allowed for 2% pay awards in both years. Hence in the first four months of the year there had been an underspend of £15k.

·      For the purpose of forecasting we had assumed that the 18/19 pay award would be agreed at 2%, backdated to July 2018, and had therefore allowed for a cost of £60k in the outturn position.

·      Activity levels in the first 4 months of the year were higher than previous, reflecting increased hours of cover as well as an increasing number of incidents and hence pay costs were higher than forecast, £100k

·      In addition RDS recruits received wholetime pay during the recruits course receiving wholetime pay rates for two weeks, resulting in an overspend of £20k due to timing.

Previously, the significant vacant posts in excess of the vacancy factor within RDS pay mitigated any overspends, however with the improvement in retention/recruitment these were  more visible, and would be reviewed for the next financial year’s budget.

Associate Trainers

21

30

The annual training plan was used to match planned training activity to staff available at the training centre.  Where this was not possible, associate trainers were brought in to cover the shortfall.  There had been trainer vacancies throughout the year to date, which had resulted in the overspend shown.

Support staff (less agency staff)

(82)

(200)

The underspend to date related to vacant posts across various departments, which were in excess of the vacancy factor built into the budget. (Note agency staff costs to date of £12k were replacing vacant support staff roles, this still only accounted for less than 1% of total support staff costs).

Some of these vacancies had now been filled, although a number of vacancies remained which were difficult to fill, most notably in ICT and Information Management, resulting in a forecast outturn underspend of £200k. The Service was continuing to review roles and structures before moving to recruitment.

Apprentice Levy

(5)

(20)

The apprentice levy was payable at 0.5% of each months payroll costs, the budget for this was set at anticipated establishment levels, hence the underspend against this budget reflected the various pay budget underspends reported above.

Pumping Appliances

The budget allowed for the purchase of 7 pumping appliances for the 2018/19 programme.  As the supplier indicated that the cost of the crew cabs had significantly risen, alternative cabs were been sourced and the order had been updated to reflect this. However due to delays thus far delivery would not take place until next financial year, although some staged payments would be made in the current year.

Other vehicles

This budget allowed for the replacement of various operational support vehicles:

·      Two Command Support Units (CSU), the requirements were currently being finalised with a view to undertaking a procurement exercise. However taking account of anticipated lead times the final costs associated with the purchase of these, £0.6m, would slip over into 2019/20;

·      One Aerial Ladder Platform which was delivered during July; and

·      One Water Tower, which had been ordered and would be delivered during the financial year.

·      Various support vehicles which were reviewed prior to replacement. As the lead times on these were relatively short we anticipated utilising this budget in year.

Operational Equipment/Future Firefighting

This budget allowed for the purchase of the technical rescue jackets, following the regional procurement exercise, which were delivered at the end of May and were now in service.

A further £200k related to the replacement of Breathing Apparatus Radios which were still being reviewed, including the potential to undertake a regional procurement process. Whilst some of this would slip into next year (£160k) we had committed to the purchase of fist microphones, which include noise cancelling facilities and hence enabled clearer voice transmission, thus aiding fire ground communications.

The balance of £200k was to meet costs associated with on-going research projects relating to new equipment, and we anticipated utilising approx. £50k of this in the current year.

Building Modifications

Completion of the new joint Fire & Ambulance facility at Lancaster was expected by mid-August, however this had not yet been achieved. Contract variations of £41k had been agreed in respect of time delays due to the discharge of planning conditions, and upgrading the appliance bay doors, however the final position in respect of variations was still being discussed with the contractors.  Final handover of the building was expected to take place in October.

In terms of the redevelopment of Preston Fire Station, it was noted that NWAS had now confirmed that they did not intend to share in a joint redevelopment of the site as it did not tie in to their longer term estates strategy. As such we had advised them that they will need to quit the site, by the end of July to enable our own redevelopment works. We were currently in the process of designing a tender specification in order to appoint consultants to take the project forward, including the redesign of the station/site. It was clear that the delays caused by NWAS would push the start of any build back into 2019/20, and hence the majority of the project costs would slip into that year, (£6.75m).

The replacement Fleet workshop was currently undergoing a detailed design prior to undertaking a tendering exercise, and again spend was likely to slip into 2019/20.

The final element of this capital budget related to the balance of the Training Centre redevelopment works, largely relating to groundworks which would only be carried out following completion of the Fleet workshop.

IT systems

The majority of the capital budget related to the national Emergency Services Mobile Communications Project (ESMCP), to replace the Airwave wide area radio system and the replacement of the station end mobilising system. The ESMCP project budget, £1.0m, was offset by anticipated grant, however the timing of both expenditure and grant was dependent upon progress against the national project. This national project had suffered lengthy delays to date, and it was likely that both elements of the budget would slip into 2019/20.

Given the delay on the ESMCP project, the replacement station end project had also been delayed. However we could not delay this indefinitely and had therefore commenced work to replace the station end in the current financial year, whilst ensuring that any solution would be compatible with the eventual ESMCP solution.

The budget also allowed for the replacement of the Services wide area network (WAN) providing an enhanced network and improving speed of use across the Service, and having agreed a contract for this we anticipated this being completed in the current financial year.

The balance of the budget related to the replacement of various systems, in line with the ICT asset management plan. Whilst procurement work was on-going to facilitate the replacement of some of these systems in the current year, we were still reviewing the need to replace others. Hence further updates on progress would confirm which replacements were being actioned in the current year and anticipated spend profiles. For the purpose of forecasting we had assumed that these would slip into 2019/20.