Agenda and minutes

Of the previous meeting held on 24 April 2024 attached.

RESOLVED that the Minutes of the meeting held on 24 April 2024 be signed as a correct record.

Report of the Assistant Director, Corporate Services (PC/24/8) attached.

The Committee received for information a report of the Assistant Director - Corporate Services (PC/24/8) detailing performance as at Quarter 1 of 2024-25 against those Key Performance Indicators agreed by the Committee for measuring progress against the following three strategic priorities as approved by the Authority:

3(a).                  Ensure that the workforce is highly trained and has the capability and             capacity to deliver services professionally, safely and effectively;

3(b).                  Increase the diversity of the workforce to better reflect the             communities we serve, promoting inclusion and developing strong and             effective leaders who ensure that we have a fair place to work where             our organisational values are a lived experience; and

3(c).                  Recognise and maximise the value of all employees, particularly the             commitment of on-call firefighters, improving recruitment and             retention.

In particular, the report provided information on performance against each of the following key measures:

• operational core competence skills (beathing apparatus; incident command; water rescue; safety when working at heights or in confined spaces; maritime; driving; and casualty care);
• fitness testing (including support offered for red and amber groups);
• health and safety (a general overview of the work undertaken on station audits and the risk from contaminants, accidents [including near misses]; personal injuries; vehicle incidents (together with the correlation to appliance mobilisation) and reporting against the Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations 2013 (RIDDOR));
• sickness and absence (including musculoskeletal, mental health and other absence) for wholetime, on-call, support, Control and casual staff, proportion of sickness absence per reason, details of the health and wellbeing support offered by the Service;
• summary on capability, disciplinary and grievance cases over the past 12 month period, and a comparison to the previous year;
• strategic workforce planning including details of staff turnover and attrition in all categories of the workforce; and
• an overview of the People Services Systems project.

These areas were expanded upon in more depth at the meeting as follows:

• operational core competencies - all performance measures were on or above target of 95% (green) with the exception of Working at Height (WAH) and Confined Spaces (SHACS) which was at 91.9% (amber).  The Academy was about to separate out old WAH qualification standards from the existing figures and fully migrate to the new SHACS standards which should impact reporting of performance in this area making it more accurate;
• fitness - it was noted that 1504 staff had been tested as of 11 July 2024 and 1448 (96%) had met the required standard with 15 staff failing to meet the required fitness level with 8 staff on long term sickness.  The question was raised as to the age groups of those failing the test and whether the tests were fir for purpose.  The Clerk to the Authority advised that a presentation on fitness would be given at a future Members’ Forum to provide such information;
• health and safety – following a Reporting of Incidents, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations (RIDDOR) incident at the Academy Breathing Apparatus facility, the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) had visited  ...  view the full minutes text for item PC/24/2