Agenda for Nottinghamshire and City of Nottingham Fire and Rescue Authority - Community Safety on Friday, 17th January, 2020, 11.00 am

Agenda and minutes

Venue: Fire and Rescue Service Headquarters, Bestwood Lodge, Arnold, Nottingham, NG5 8PD

Contact: Cath Ziane-Pryor  Email: catherine.pryor@nottinghamcity.gov.uk

Items
No. Item

10.

APOLOGIES FOR ABSENCE

Minutes:

Craig Parkin, Deputy Chief Fire Officer

11.

DECLARATIONS OF INTERESTS

Minutes:

None.

12.

MINUTES pdf icon PDF 133 KB

Of the meeting held on 4 October 2019 (for confirmation)

Minutes:

The minutes of the meeting held on 4 October 2019 were confirmed as a true record and signed by the Chair.

13.

SERVICE DELIVERY PERFORMANCE pdf icon PDF 541 KB

Report of the Chief Fire Officer

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The Fire Brigades Union (FBU) submitted a question which was responded to at the end of the item.

 

Mick Sharman, Area Manager for Response, presented the report which provides the Committee with performance data for the period between 1 July and 30 September 2019.

 

The following points were highlighted:

 

a)  a total of 2,579 incidents were attended, which is a decrease of 1,020 incidents for the same period in 2018. A breakdown of these is included in the report;

 

b)  whilst the locally set response target is 8 minutes, the average attendance time was 8.25 minutes;

 

c)  on-call availability increased by an average of 1.36% to 83.31%, with the East Leake Station reporting the highest availability of 96.54%;

 

d)  the call answering time exceeded the ‘90% within 7 seconds’ target at 96.5%;

 

e)  the mobilisation system target of 99% was met;

 

f)  annual training was completed on schedule with 14 of the 26 planned exercises completed;

 

g)  safe and well visits exceeded the target and there has been a range of community engagement and prevention activity, particularly around smoke alarm ownership and fire safety in the home;

 

h)  non-domestic premises fire protection regulation activity continues, including activity to support the recommendations of the Phase 1 Grenfell Tower report.

 

Members’ questions were responded to as follows:

 

i)  the majority of accidental dwelling fires are cooking related. All incident data is collated and analysed and then targeted prevention campaigns introduced where appropriate;

 

j)  a question was raised about the cause of a fire at a solar farm which was reported; this information was not to hand but would be found and confirmed to the Members.

 

k)  training exercises take place at a variety of locations each year. For NHS hospitals, site specific information is available to fire fighters. Work is continuing with all non-domestic premises, including the hospitals in Nottingham, to reduce the number of unwanted fire signals. 

 

The FBU posed their question, for which a response was provided.

There was a brief adjournment of 5 minutes when an additional question was posed (in line with the requirements). It was agreed for a response to be provided in writing and also circulated to members of the Committee. Both questions and the responses are issued with the initial publication of the minutes.

 

Members of the Committee welcomed the reduction in unwanted (automated) alarms.

 

Resolved

 

1)  to note the report;

 

2)  for a summary of the planned response to a fire at a solar farm to be circulated to Members of the Committee by the Area Manager for Service Delivery  following the meeting.

 

14.

SAFER COMMUNITIES STRATEGY pdf icon PDF 2 MB

Report of the Chief Fire Officer

Minutes:

Damien West, Area Manager for Prevention, Protection and Fire Investigation, introduced the report which presents the Safer Communities Strategy to members for approval and sets targets to work towards by 2022.

 

The following points were highlighted, members’ questions responded to and comments made;

 

a)  members expressed that the objectives within the strategy needed to be tangible so that progress against them could be reported, captured and monitored. 

 

b)  there appeared to be a lack of understanding of the risk of not having and maintaining a fire alarm but with a persistent campaign, significant progress has been made;

 

c)  for some more vulnerable residents, the Fire Service will provide and fit fire alarms with 10 year battery life (as part of the safe and well visits scheme);

 

d)  although recommended where appropriate, the Service does not provide carbon-monoxide alarms as Cadent take the lead on this within the sector. 

 

Resolved to support the adoption of the Safer Communities Strategy.

 

15.

UNWANTED FIRE SIGNALS UPDATE pdf icon PDF 229 KB

Report of the Chief Fire Officer

Minutes:

Damien West, Area Manager for Prevention, Protection and Fire Investigation, presented the report which informs the Committee of the progress in reducing Unwanted Fire Alarm Signals (UwFSs) since the Services’ change in policy as of 3 December 2018.

 

The following points were highlighted, responses given to members’ questions, and comments made:

 

a)  there has been a reduction of 18% attendance to UwFSs against the same period last year;

 

b)  of the 2,510 calls received, 2,169 were UwFSs.  1365 of these incidents only had one appliance attend;

 

c)  hospitals continue to present the largest proportion of UwFS but this is reducing with 53 fewer calls against the same period last year;

 

d)  519 premises owners have been contacted where UwFS occur, and for the most common occurrences, fire safety audits are undertaken;

 

e)  whilst some members expressed continued concern that school premises alarms were challenged and not automatically responded to, they were assured that prior to placing schools in this category, thorough risk assessments had been undertaken to ensure this response was most appropriate. However, this can be reviewed and if significant additional risks are found, the categorisation can be amended.

 

Resolved to note the report and support the continuation of the Tri-Service Unwanted Fire Signals Policy.

 

16.

COMBINED CAMPAIGN CALENDAR pdf icon PDF 347 KB

Report of the Chief Fire Officer

Minutes:

Damien West, Area Manager for Prevention, Protection and Fire Investigation presented the Services’ combined campaign calendar which lists engagement, support, and activity by the Service and with partners, in response recommendations made in the HMICRFS report to promote the greater efficiency for all partners.

 

The themes of campaigns and activity range from safety awareness such as drowning prevention, road safety and home fire safety, to community and faith focus including Holocaust Memorial Day and British Sign Language Week.

 

Resolved to endorse the approach being taken in relation to campaigns across 2020.

 

17.

UPDATE ON THE SERVICE RESPONSE TO HER MAJESTY'S INSPECTORATE OF CONSTABULARY AND FIRE AND RESCUE SERVICES INSPECTION pdf icon PDF 161 KB

Report of the Chief Fire Officer

Minutes:

Damien West, Area Manager for Prevention, Protection and Fire Investigation presented the report which includes the Services’ responses to the findings of inspection by her Majesty’s Inspectorate for Constabulary Fire and Rescue Services (HMICFRS).

 

In total there were 25 areas highlighted for improvement by the inspection, 12 of which are relevant to the Community Safety Committee. These have been charted with commentary outlining the issues and how they are to be addressed.

 

Questions from Committee Members were responded to as follows:

 

a)  there has been a long-standing agreement whereby firefighters from several fire stations towards the edges of the county cross borders to support neighbouring services, which is reciprocated when appropriate. This is a practical solution to best supports citizens;

 

b)  where the Service may be the first to attend a multi-agency incident, it will take initial control and if not a Fire Service focused incident, will hand over incident management to the relevant agency on their arrival. For instance, fires are obviously responsibility of the Fire Service, whilst the main responsibility in responding to terrorism incidents usually sits with the Police;

 

c)  training on critical skills is continuous with a 14 week course for starters, and then ongoing throughout their career with a risk based approach resulting in annual refresher training for some skills, and lower frequency training for other skills. 

 

Members of the committee expressed an interest in the different types of training undertaken and were invited to attend some future sessions.

 

Resolved to note the progress made against the agreed action plan.