Agenda item

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.

 

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’ presented as a percentage extent of fire and heat damage.

 

The extent of fire and heat damage was recorded at the time the ‘stop’ message was sent and included all damage types.  The report charted a rolling quarterly severity of accidental dwelling fire over the previous two years with each quarter broken down into high, medium and low severity.  Each quarter included the percentage (out of 100%) that each severity type represented of the total, with an indicator to illustrate the direction against the same quarter of the previous year.

 

The latest quarter recorded a combined ‘low’ and ‘medium’ severity of 95.7% which was an increase of 0.6% against the 95.1% recorded in the same quarter of the previous year.

 

Severity (Direction against the same quarter of previous year)		Previous Rolling 4 Quarters				Quarter 3
		Quarter 3	Quarter 4	Quarter 1	Quarter 2
High	ò	4.9%	8.2%	7.1%	3.5%	4.3%
Medium	ò	57.8%	51.0%	52.4%	43.9%	47.6%
Low	Ç	37.4%	40.8%	40.4%	52.55%	48.1%

 

 

1.3.2   Accidental Dwelling Fires – Number of Incidents where occupants have received a Home Fire Safety Check

 

This indicator reported the number of primary fires where a dwelling had been affected and the cause of fire had been recorded as ‘Accidental or Not known’ by the extent of the fire and heat damage. The HFSC must be a completed job (i.e. not a refusal) carried out by LFRS personnel or partner agency. The HFSC must have been carried out within 12 months prior to the fire occurring.

 

	2020/21		2019/20
	ADF’s with previous HFSC	% of ADF’s with previous HFSC	ADF’s with previous HFSC	% of ADF’s with previous HFSC
Q1	26	12%	23	11%
Q2	21	11%	26	13%
Q3	31	13%	31	15%
Q4			27	14%

 

1.4 Accidental Dwelling Fire Casualties

 

This indicator reported the number of fire related fatalities, slight and serious injuries at primary fires where a dwelling had been affected and the cause of fire had been recorded as ‘Accidental or Not known’. A slight injury was defined as; a person attending hospital as an outpatient (not precautionary check). A serious injury was defined as; at least an overnight stay in hospital as an in-patient.

 

The Deputy Chief Fire Officer reported that sadly there was 1 dwelling fire fatality in the quarter.  One casualty was recorded as serious and 12 slight.  The same quarter of the previous year recorded no fatalities, 8 serious and 10 slight.

 

Casualty Status	2020/21 Quarter 3	2019/20 Quarter 3
Fatal	1	0
Victim went to hospital visit, injuries appeared Serious	1	8
Victim went to hospital visit, injuries appeared Slight	12	10
TOTAL	14	18

 

1.5       Accidental Building Fires (Non-Dwellings)

 

This indicator reported number of primary fires where the property type was ‘Building’ and the property sub type did not equal ‘Dwelling’ and the cause of fire had been recorded as ‘Accidental’ or ‘Not known’.

 

Quarterly activity increased 8.33% over the same quarter of the previous year.

 

Total number of incidents	2020/21 Quarter 3	2019/20 Quarter 3
	78	72

 

1.5.1   Accidental Building Fires (Non-Dwellings) – Extent of Damage (Fire Severity)

 

The Deputy Chief Fire Officer advised that whilst the level of damage from accidental dwelling fires was reducing; in commercial buildings it was increasing.  On investigation there had been a significant increase in fires in private sheds and outbuildings which could be quickly lost to fire prior to the arrival of the Fire and Rescue Service.

 

This indicator reported the number of primary fires where the property type was a building and the property sub-type was not a dwelling and the cause of fire had been recorded as ‘Accidental or Not known’ presented as a percentage extent of fire and heat damage.

 

The extent of fire and heat damage was recorded at the time the ‘stop’ message was sent and included all damage types.  The report charted a rolling quarterly severity of accidental building fires over the previous two years with each quarter broken down into high, medium and low severity.  Each quarter included the percentage (out of 100%) that each severity type represented of the total, with an indicator to illustrate the direction against the same quarter of the previous year.

 

The latest quarter recorded a combined ‘low’ and ‘medium’ severity of 75.6%.  This was a decrease of 11.9% against a combined severity of 87.5% in the same quarter of the previous year.

 

Severity (Direction against the same quarter of previous year)		Previous Rolling 4 Quarters				Quarter 3
		Quarter 3	Quarter 4	Quarter 1	Quarter 2
High	Ç	12.5%	16.4%	43.4%	39.7%	24.4%
Medium	Ç	58.3%	64.4%	47.8%	43.8%	64.1%
Low	ò	29.2%	19.2%	8.8%	16.4%	11.5%

 

1.6 Deliberate Fires

 

The Deputy Chief Fire Officer was really pleased to report that through the proactive work undertaken by the Service and work with Police colleagues the Service had seen the lowest level of deliberate fires over the last decade (particularly secondary fires throughout November and December).  At the end of the report a presentation would be given by Area Manager Hutton on the community safety work undertaken during the “BrightSparx” period.

 

This indicator reported the number of primary and secondary fires where the cause of fire had been recorded as 'Deliberate'.  Secondary fires were the majority of outdoor fires including grassland and refuse fires unless they involved casualties or rescues, property loss or 5 or more appliances attended. They included fires in single derelict buildings.

 

Deliberate Fire Type	2020/21 Quarter 3	2019/20 Quarter 3
1.6.1 Deliberate Fires – Anti-Social Behaviour	290	345
1.6.2 Deliberate Fires – Dwellings	31	29
1.6.3 Deliberate Fires – Non-Dwellings	27	35

 

1.7      Home Fire Safety Checks

 

This indicator reported the percentage of completed Home Fire Safety Checks (HFSC), excluding refusals, carried out where the risk score had been determined to be high.

 

An improvement was shown if: i) the total number of HFSC’s completed was greater than the comparable quarter of the previous year; and ii) the percentage of high HFSC outcomes was greater than the comparable quarter of the previous year.

 

The number of completed HFSC’s had decreased 29% over the same quarter as the previous year; due to the challenges presented by the Covid 19 pandemic. However, through a modified HFSC engagement with the most vulnerable had resulted in a 9% increase of those with a high-risk outcome.

 

	2020/21	2019/20
	% of High HFSC outcomes	% of High HFSC outcomes
Q1	71%	65%
Q2	72%	61%
Q3	69%	60%
Q4		61%

 

To help illustrate the importance of the Home Fire Safety Check service; properties that had refused a HFSC, but subsequently, suffered an Accidental Dwelling Fire were monitored.  During this quarter 7 properties recorded an ADF after refusing a HFSC during the previous rolling 12-month period.

 

1.8      Road Safety Education Evaluation

 

This indicator reported the percentage of participants of the Wasted Lives and Road Sense education packages that showed a positive change to less risky behaviour following the programme; based on comparing the overall responses to an evaluation question before and after the course.

 

Total participants were a combination of those engaged with at Wasted Lives and Road Sense events.

 

	2020/21 (cumulative)		2019/20 (cumulative)
	Total participants	% positive influence on participants’ behaviour	Total participants	% positive influence on participants’ behaviour
Q1	The covid-19 pandemic led to the closure of educational facilities which meant it was not possible to deliver road safety activities in the normal way.		4,354	85%
Q2			8,158	85%
Q3			16,417	85%
Q4			21,516	85%

 

It was noted that the pandemic had led to the closure of educational facilities and the Service had been unable to deliver road safety activities in the normal way.  However, to ensure road safety messages continued to be available, the Service had undertaken Wasted Lives sessions via an online video chat service.  During quarter 3 there had been 5 Wasted Lives sessions, involving 40 attendees.  The Service also continued to engage with people via social media platforms (which included coverage of the Road Safety week during November) and information was shared via the Biker Down webpage.  Later on the agenda, was a presentation on the work of the Road Safety Partnership.

 

1.9       Fire Safety Enforcement

 

This indicator reported the number of Fire Safety Enforcement inspections carried out within the period resulting in supporting businesses to improve and become compliant with fire safety regulations or to take formal action of enforcement and prosecution of those that failed to comply.

 

Formal activity was defined as one or more of the following: enforcement notice or an action plan, alterations notice or prohibition notice.

 

An improvement was shown if the percentage of adults ‘requiring formal activity’ was greater than the comparable quarter of the previous year.  This helped inform that the correct businesses were being identified.

 

*The ‘number of inspections’ count included business safety advice and advice to other enforcement authorities not captured within the formal/informal or satisfactory counts.

 

	2020/21					2019/20
	*No. of Inspections	Requiring		Satisfactory Audit	% requiring Formal Activity	% requiring Formal Activity
		Formal Activity	Informal Activity
Q1	18	5	7	4	28%	9%
Q2	48	7	29	9	15%	9%
Q3	83	12	59	4	14%	10%
Q4						13%

 

The Deputy Chief Fire Officer advised that the Service continued to inspect based on risk.  The percentages shown which required formal activity were higher than the previous year; this demonstrated the successful targeting of buildings most at risk. 

 

KPI 2 – Responding, to fire and other emergencies quickly and competently

 

The Deputy Chief Fire Officer advised that in the main the Service was reaching very stretching response standards ie: setting a 90%, 6?minute attendance standard to very high-risk areas was probably amongst the quickest response arrangements across the country with many other Services having response standards of 10 – 15 minutes. 

 

The Deputy Chief Fire Officer was pleased to advise that North West Fire Control had reported call handling times had reduced to fire incidents across the last quarter to an average of 76 seconds against a target of 90 seconds. 

 

2.1.1   Emergency Response Standards - Critical Fires – 1st Fire Engine Attendance

 

 

This indicator reported the ‘Time of Call’ (TOC) and ‘Time in Attendance’ (TIA) of the first fire engine arriving at the incident in less than the relevant response standard.

 

The response standards included call handling and fire engine response time for the first fire engine attending a critical fire, these were as follows: -

 

·         Very high-risk area = 6 minutes

·         High risk area = 8 minutes

·         Medium risk area = 10 minutes

·         Low risk area = 12 minutes

 

The response standards were determined by the risk map score and subsequent risk grade for the location of the fire.

 

Standard: to be in attendance within response standard target on 90% of occasions.

 

Quarter 3 – 1st pump response increased 1.52% of total first fire engine attendances over the same quarter of the previous year.

 

Year to Date	2020/21 Quarter 3	Previous year to Date	2019/20 Quarter 3
88.80%	89.58%	88.31%	88.06%

 

 

2.1.2   Emergency Response Standards - Critical Fires – 2nd Fire Engine Attendance

 

This indicator reported the time taken for the second fire engine to attend a critical fire incident measured from the time between the second fire engine arriving and the time of call. The target is determined by the risk map score and subsequent risk grade for the location of the fire.

 

Standard: to be in attendance within response standard target on 85% of occasions.

 

Quarter 3 – 2nd pump response increased 3.56% of total second pump attendances over the same quarter of the previous year.

 

Year to Date	2020/21 Quarter 3	Previous year to Date	2019/20 Quarter 3
86.40%	87.77%	86.67%	84.21%

 

2.2.1   Emergency Response Standards - Critical Special Service – 1st Fire Engine Attendance

 

This indicator measured how long it took the first fire engine to respond to critical non-fire incidents such as road traffic collisions, rescues and hazardous materials incidents.  For those incidents there was a single response standard which measured call handling time and fire engine response time.  The response standard for the first fire engine attending a critical special call was 13 minutes.

 

Standard: to be in attendance within response standard target on 90% of occasions.

 

The latest quarter 1st pump response decreased 2.96% over the same quarter of the previous year.

 

Year to Date	2020/21 Quarter 3	Previous year to Date	2019/20 Quarter 3
86.76%	87.83%	89.30%	90.51%

 

2.3       Fire Engine Availability – Wholetime, Day Crewing and Day Crewing Plus

 

This indicator measured the availability of fire engines that were crewed by wholetime, day crewing and day crewing plus shifts. It was measured as the percentage of time a fire engine was available to respond compared to the total time in the period.

 

Fire engines were designated as unavailable for the following reasons:

 

•      Mechanical	•      Lack of equipment
•      Crew deficient	•      Miscellaneous
•      Engineer working on station	•      Unavailable
•      Appliance change over	•      Welfare
•      Debrief

 

Standard: 99.5%

 

Year to date availability of 99.29% was a decrease of 0.21% over the same period of the previous year.

 

Year to Date	2020/21 Quarter 3	Previous year to Date	2019/20 Quarter 3
99.29%	99.16%	99.50%	99.51%

 

2.4      Fire Engine Availability – On-Call Duty System

 

This indicator measured the availability of fire engines that were crewed by the on-call duty system. It was measured as the percentage of time a fire engine was available to respond compared to the total time in the period.

 

Fire engines were designated as unavailable (off the run) for the following reasons which include the percentage of off the run hours that each reason contributed to the total.   Members noted that fire engines can be off the run for more than one reason; hence the percentages were interpreted individually (rather than as a proportion of the total):

 

·         Manager deficient                      61%

·         Crew deficient                            63%

·         Not enough BA wearers           51%

·         No driver                                      36%

 

Standard: above 95%

 

Year to date availability 90.46%, a 4.46% increase against the previous year to date total availability of 86.60%.

 

Year to Date	2020/21 Quarter 3	Previous year to Date	2019/20 Quarter 3
90.46%	87.90%	86.60%	87.47%

 

The Deputy Chief Fire Officer advised the on-call availability was amongst the very best in the country which had been impacted (positively) through employers furloughing staff which had enabled on-call staff to provide more cover.  It was noted that many other Services had around 60-70% availability.

 

2.4.1   Fire Engine Availability – On-Call Duty System (without wholetime detachments)

 

Subset of KP1 2.4 and provided for information only

This indicator measured the availability of fire engines that were crewed by the on-call duty system (OC) when wholetime detachments were not used to support availability. It was measured by calculating the percentage of time a fire engine was available to respond compared to the total time in the period.

 

Fire engines were designated as unavailable (off-the-run) for the following reasons:

 

·         Manager deficient         

·         Crew deficient               

·         Not enough BA wearers

·         No driver                         

 

Standard: As a subset of KPI 2.4 there was no standard attributable to this KPI.

 

The percentage of time that OC crewed engines were available for quarter 3 was 86.15%. This excluded the wholetime detachments shown in KPI 2.4.

 

2.5      Staff Accidents

 

This indicator measured the number of staff accidents.

The number of staff accidents during the latest quarter decreased by 28.57% against the same quarter of the previous year.

 

Year to Date	2020/21 Quarter 3	Previous year to Date	2019/20 Quarter 3
50	15	62	21

 

KPI 3 – Delivering, value for money in how we use our resources

 

3.1      Progress against Savings Programme

 

The annual budget for 2020/21 was set at £57.3m with a budget to 31 December of £40.8m.  The spend for the same period was £39.9m which gave an underspend of £0.9m; a variance of -1.57%.  This was a result of the pandemic continuing to affect planned spend activity during the period.  This position would continue to be monitored in the forthcoming months.

 

3.2      Overall User Satisfaction

 

There had been 2,553 people surveyed since April 2012 and the number satisfied with the service was 2,525; % satisfied was 98.90% against a standard of 97.50%; a variance of 1.44%.

 

During the latest quarter, 27 people were surveyed and 27 responded that they were ‘very satisfied’ or ‘fairly satisfied’ with the service they received.

 

KPI 4 – Valuing, our people so that they can focus on making Lancashire safer

 

4.1    Overall Staff Engagement

 

An engagement index was calculated based on five questions measuring pride, advocacy, attachment, inspiration and motivation; factors that were understood to be important features shared by staff engaged with the organisation.

 

For each respondent an engagement score was calculated as the average score across the five questions where strongly disagree is equivalent to 0, disagree is equivalent to 25, neither agree nor disagree is equivalent to 50, agree is equivalent to 75 and strongly agree is equivalent to 100. The engagement index was then calculated as the average engagement score in the organisation. This approach meant that a score of 100 was equivalent to all respondents saying strongly agree to all five engagement questions, while a score of 0 was equivalent to all respondents saying strongly disagree to all five engagement questions.  An improvement was shown if the percentage engagement index was greater than the previous survey. The engagement index was previously measured in the last full staff survey undertaken in May 2018.

 

Staff were surveyed from October to December 2020 on topics including working at LFRS; equality, diversity and inclusion; health and wellbeing; training and development; leadership and management; and internal communication.

 

The engagement index was 79%, an increase of 9% on the 2018 survey.

The number of responses was 458, a decrease of 6% on the 2018 survey.

 

This equated to a decrease of 31 people however the Service was unable to undertake focus groups and engage with crews at stations due to the coronavirus pandemic. These were carried out extensively during the last survey to encourage participation.

 

4.2.1 Staff Absence – Excluding on-Call Duty System

 

This indicator measured the cumulative number of shifts (days) lost due to sickness for all wholetime, day crewing plus, day crewing and support staff divided by the total number of staff.

 

Annual Standard: Not more than 5 shifts lost

Cumulative total number of monthly shifts lost 5.300

 

This was a negative exception report due to the number of shifts lost through absence per employee being above the Service target for each month during quarter 3.

 

The Deputy Chief Fire Officer presented Members with the analysis, that:

 

During October 2020 – December 2020, absence statistics showed above target for all three months for both Whole-time personnel and Non-uniformed personnel.  There were 10 cases of long-term absence which spanned over the total of the 3 months and there were 21 other cases of long term absence which were also recorded within the 3 months; reasons for these absences were set out in the report.  It was noted that during the quarter 16 employees had returned to duty.

 

At the end of December 2020, the cumulative totals showed that non-uniformed staff absence was above target at 6.73 shifts lost per employee, for whole-time uniformed staff absence was also above target at 4.84 shifts lost per employee.

 

Overall absence for all staff (except On Call staff) was 5.3 shifts lost which was above the Service target of 3.75 shifts lost for this quarter.

 

The cumulative figures in the period included employees absent due to coronavirus and those required to self-isolate as a result of coronavirus since 1st September 2020.

 

Members also considered the actions undertaken to improve performance which included that the Service aimed to continue with:

 

·         Early intervention by Occupational Health Unit (OHU) doctor / nurse / physiotherapist;

·         Human Resources supported managers in following the Absence Management Policy managing individual long-term cases, addressing review periods / triggers in a timely manner and dealing with capability of staff due to health issues;

·         To be included again within the leadership conference to assist future managers understanding and interpretation of the policy;

·         Encouraging employees to make use of our Employee Assistance Programme provider Health Assured and The Firefighters Charity;

·         HR to be in attendance at Stress Risk Assessment meetings, to support managers and to offer appropriate support to the employee along with signposting;

·         OHU to organise health checks for individuals on a voluntary basis;

·         Support from Service Fitness Advisor / Personal Training Instructors;

·         Promotion of health, fitness and wellbeing via the routine bulletin and Employee Assistance programme.

 

4.2.2   Staff Absence – On-Call Duty System

 

This indicator measured the percentage of contracted hours lost due to sickness for all on-call contracted staff.

 

Annual Standard: Not more than 2.5% lost as % of available hours of cover.

 

Cumulative on-call absence (as % of available hours cover) at the end of the quarter, 0.92%.

 

 

The Chairman commented that a number of years ago the Committee had serious concerns in relation to the performance of the call handling centre and had limited conversation with North West Fire Control.  Representatives were invited to attend quarter 2 and quarter 4 meetings.  As a consequence, the Committee had a better knowledge and understanding of the challenges faced by North West Fire Control and the Service and there had been a significant improvement in performance which was commendable.  He asked that this be noted in the minutes and that the Committee be given credit for embarking on that engagement.

 

In response to a question from Councillor Smith regarding how the Service captured the exceptional performance of staff supporting the vaccination programme the Deputy Chief Fire Officer advised that this was captured in the community fire safety reports presented to the Authority meetings.  To date over 300 staff had volunteered with over 100,000 vaccinations given of which 10,000 had been delivered by Lancashire Fire and Rescue Service (LFRS) staff.  LFRS was the first Service to support the vaccination programme.  Colleagues in corporate communications were sending messages out using social media, Teams meetings were being held with volunteers to thank them for their support and members of the senior team were visible at vaccination centres to thank staff.

 

BrightSparx

Area Manager Mark Hutton summarised BrightSparx, which was a major winter safety campaign that included work undertaken across the Service which had contributed to some of the positive performance reported earlier in relation to antisocial behaviour fires, deliberate fires and accidental fires and casualties during the bonfire period (October/November) which for the Service started much earlier in May/June.  It was noted that covid restrictions this year had meant that normal diversionary activities in the districts were not available (such as public bonfires).  The presentation focussed on how the Service had used resources as effectively as possible to deliver this performance. 

 

The BrightSparx campaign aimed to: i) maximise public and responder safety; ii) target resources at the areas and demographic groups most at risk based on data and incident intelligence; iii) increase target audience awareness of Bonfire and Firework Safety; iv) ensure legal compliance regarding safe storage and the sale of fireworks; v) identify and work closely with appropriate partners and vi) to reassure members of the public who may be concerned that the Service was pro-active in managing the risks associated with Firework and Bonfire related activity, whilst also recognising that for many the period was one of celebration.

 

Area Manager Hutton outlined the details of the media campaign which was viewed as being more essential than ever due to the limited opportunity for face to face engagement / education.  The Service worked with Lancashire Resilience Forum partners with clear target groups to take a co?ordinated approach across multiple platforms.

 

In addition, prevention and education included a Virtual Library which was refreshed with current and relevant material aligned to target groups and the ongoing Covid compliance campaign.  This was used by the Fire Cadets and the Prince’s Trust programme to assist youth engagement.  Environmental Visual Audits were undertaken by crews to support district council street cleaning and cleansing teams waste removal work.  Where covid rules allowed, innovative engagement methods were used which included radio interview and videos playing in entrances to schools / Mosques.

 

The Protection Team monitored lists of firework storage and retail sites from Trading Standards which were updated regularly as these changed throughout the period and risk information was added to Fire Appliance Mobile Data Terminals.  Protection Fire Safety Inspectors undertook targeted audits of premises which presented the greatest risk.

 

Annual plans were well rehearsed in conjunction with Lancashire Constabulary and the North West Ambulance Service.  Multiagency cars were deployed in each area (based on historical data and current intelligence) over the 4 nights predicted to have the highest activity.  The Command Support Room was staffed at Service Headquarters with multi-agency co-ordination from Greenbank Police Station.  In addition, LFRS Managers, co-located in North West Fire Control were deployed to small fires in lieu of appliances to triage response and maintain fire appliance availability for genuine emergencies.  In total these vehicles responded to 67 incidents.

 

LFRS employed a debrief and analysis process deemed essential to maintain effectiveness which was used to inform the following years plan.  This included: objective data and subjective feedback which would contribute to the usual performance reporting cycle and meet an improvement area cited by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue Services.

 

Performance Outcomes

Overall, 230 media articles reached 9.23 million people and had 83% positive sentiment which equated to an advertising value equivalent of £132,000.  The virtual Bonfire Night hosted live on the Service’s Facebook and YouTube page reached over 270,000 people from the UK and abroad.  Almost 4,000 comments and messages were received from people thanking everyone involved and saying how much they enjoyed it and over £1,800 was raised for the Firefighters’ Charity.

 

Digital School Education Sessions were delivered to:

 

KS2 - 52 schools (12 sessions) - 4,390 pupils

KS3 - 18 schools (26 sessions) - 6,425 pupils

Total - 70 schools (38 sessions) - 10,815 pupils

 

50% of schools provided feedback with 90% of respondents grading the sessions as good or outstanding

 

It was noted that: i) the number of fires from antisocial behaviour during the period was 192 which was the lowest in 5 years; ii) there was an increase in accidental secondary fires (from 120 in 2019/20) to 179 in 2020/21 (which was thought to be due to more bonfires held at home); iii) casualties (incidents which the Service attended) remained at low levels (with 1 casualty during the period); and iv) there was a slight increase (from 3 in 2019/20) to 4 in 2020/21 of attacks on firefighters predominantly in the eastern part of the county.

 

RESOLVED: - That the Committee endorsed the Measuring Progress report for Quarter 3 (including noting the contents of the 1 negative exception report and the BrightSparx presentation).