Agenda item

Report of the Director of Finance, People & Estates (PC/22/7) attached.

The Committee received for information a report of the Director of Finance, People & Estates (PC/22/7) detailing performance as at Quarter 4 of 2021-22 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);

·           workforce planning;

·           health and safety (accidents [including near misses]; personal injuries; vehicle incidents);

·           sickness and absence (including mental health) for wholetime, on-call, support, Control and casual staff, by type of sickness;

·           fitness testing;

·           diversity;

·           promoting inclusion, developing strong leaders, living Service values and being a fair place to work;

·           grievance, capability and disciplinary issues;

·           recruitment and retention (including Pay for Availability benefits); and

·           employee engagement.

The report also identified Service performance when benchmarked against national statistics relating to sickness, annual personal injuries, annual vehicle incidents and RIDDOR (injuries, diseases and dangerous occurrences) reportable events.

In debating the report, the following comments were made:

·         the significant improvement in core competence maintenance for water rescue was acknowledged. It was clarified that there were different levels of competence involved with this measure, with all operational staff having basic water safety competence, with some specialist teams having higher water rescue competence;

·         that, while there was no requirement for the Service to report on sickness absences due specifically to COVID, it would be beneficial to maintain a general awareness of this. The Service had in place measures to mitigate against any detrimental impacts from COVID on prevention, protection and response activities;

·         that a Level 3 (highest level) investigation was in train for the rope “near miss” incident and that, pending the outcome of this investigation, all static ropes had been removed from use to mitigate any further risk;

·         that, while there would always be a degree of subjectivity in determining whether the causes of stress were work or non-work related, the Service procedures in place were sufficiently robust to ensure that decisions on this were not made arbitrarily and that the culture enabled staff to express concerns and access appropriate support;

·         that, due to timing issues, national average figures for sickness absence were not available for this report but would be included in the next report; and

·         that significant progress had been made to address the “cause for concern” on firefighter fitness identified following the 2019 Service inspection by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue Services (HMICFRS) and that this “cause for concern” would be removed, formally, in the published findings from the 2021 inspection.