We make our communities safer East Sussex Fire Authority Our Corporate Plan 2019-2020 Alternative formats and translation Contents Introduction...........................................................................................................................2 The Fire Authority...................................................................................................................4 The Members of the Fire Authority are:.................................................................................5 About East Sussex Fire and Rescue Service........................................................................6 Service Structure...................................................................................................................8 Setting the strategic direction.................................................................................................9 Our Strategies.....................................................................................................................10 Our priorities........................................................................................................................10 Delivering our purpose and commitments...........................................................................11 What we’ve achieved and our plans for this year................................................................12 Celebrating staff success.....................................................................................................26 Asking the public..................................................................................................................28 Our Finances........................................................................................................................29 Contact us...........................................................................................................................31 Introduction The year ahead There are a number of key priorities for the coming years and we have set ourselves a Over the past two years, East Sussex Fire Authority has overseen an ambitious change challenging programme which includes: programme in how its fire and rescue services are provided across East Sussex and the City of Brighton & Hove. • Developing our future mobilising arrangements A number of strategies have been refreshed and they set out what we want to achieve in • Improving financial sustainability with further refinement of our efficiency plan, looking terms of our People, Inclusion and Diversity, Health, Safety and Wellbeing, Information at how we can access different funding opportunities Management, Procurement, Estates and Communication and Engagement. • Introducing a new approach to our response fleet We have reset our service delivery priorities in our Safer Communities Strategy in order to explicitly demonstrate how we are responding to the risks in our areas with targeted • We will be reviewing whether or not we have the right number of fire appliances prevention and protection work. and other specialist vehicles and equipment available to respond to fires and other emergency incidents in our area ensuring we take a risk-based approach, within the These are: context of funding challenges: • Home fire safety • We will be reviewing some parts of our support services • Road safety • Embedding the service delivery review changes • Water safety • Ensuring we are able to respond effectively to any future outcomes from the Grenfell Inquiry. • Health safety We will also be welcoming Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue • Business safety Services (HMICFRS) this year who are carrying out an independent inspection of all English Fire and Rescue Services to see how we are progressing with the Government’s We have now completed a two year Service Delivery structure review that has been fire reform agenda of accountability and transparency, efficiency and collaboration and shaped by our staff, focusing on wellbeing, effectiveness and efficiency. This has workforce reform. provided a more agile and enabling structure that compliments the development of our supporting processes and systems (Support and Delivery Framework), we are about to Financial environment conclude a review of demand of three types of incident that is designed to further enhance the prioritisation of incidents ensuring critical emergency services can be used more The Fire Authority still faces financial challenges in the face of continued uncertainty on effectively. We are part way through an appliance review, an on-call review, a business funding with the forecasted need to save between £2.8M and £3.7M over the medium term continuity review and duty system review all of which is being pieced together through which is in addition to savings of £8.7M delivered since 2010. the overarching Operational Response Review that then feeds our wider Integrated Risk Management Plan. The review of our Response and Resilience will now capture this This plan sets out some short, medium and longer-term proposals aimed at ensuring we series of interconnected work. are improving services for the people of East Sussex and the City of Brighton & Hove, particularly the most high risk and vulnerable members of our communities. We introduced new response standards developed with our staff and community as We are pleased to be able to report that we have achieved a number of improvements part of our last integrated risk management plan. The views of staff and the public were over the last year, and these will be built upon over the next year to ensure we are considered and this has seen the introduction of a ten-minute response standard for all providing our communities with an effective and efficient fire and rescue service. incidents, with the first fire engine with an ‘on-station’ response of 10 minutes 70% of the time and an attendance standard for the first fire engine with an ‘on-call’ response of 15 minutes 70% of the time. Roy Galley Chairman of East Sussex Fire Authority We have undertaken a staff survey to gain a better understanding and insight into employee feelings, satisfaction and engagement levels and to understand the key issues that are important to the workforce. This has led to the development of an employee engagement framework and will inform our future direction. Dawn Whittaker Chief Fire Officer and Chief Executive Page 2 Page 3 The Fire Authority The Members of the Fire Authority East Sussex Fire Authority (the Authority) is a statutory body, made up of locally elected Councillors from East Sussex County Council (ESCC) and Brighton and Hove City Council are: (B&HCC). There are 18 councillors, of which, 12 are from East Sussex County Council and 6 are from Brighton and Hove City Council. The Authority normally meets five times a year, with an annual general meeting in June. Chairman Vice Chair Fire Authority Roy Galley Carolyn Lambert Councillors Conservative Liberal Democrat The dates of the meetings can be found here https://www.esfrs.org/about-us/east-sussex- ESCC ESCC fire-authority/fire-authority-meetings/ along with information about how you can attend meetings and what is discussed. The role of the Authority is to ensure that the services provided by ESFRS are delivered Garry Peltzer Brighton & Amanda Evans economically efficiently and effectively and meet the needs of the communities we serve. Dunn Hove City Labour Under the Fire and Rescue Services Act 2004 the Authority is legally required to enforce Conservative Councillors BHCC fire safety legislation and to reduce the risk of fire causing death, serious injury and BHCC property related losses to the community. It must also make provision for rescuing people in the event of road traffic collisions and for protecting people from serious harm arising from road traffic collisions. Les Hamilton The Authority is legally responsible for the enforcement of the Regulatory Reform 2005 Marianna Ebel Steph Powell Labour Green Party Green Party (Fire Safety) Order which is applicable across England and Wales. This Order places the BHCC BHCC BHCC responsibility on individuals within an organisation to carry out risk assessments to identify, manage and reduce the risk of fire within public and commercial buildings. The Authority is also a designated Category 1 responder under the Civil Contingencies Act 2004. This Act requires emergency responders in England and Wales to co-operate in Carol Theobald East Sussex Chris Dowling maintaining a public Community Risk Register which is a product of the Sussex Resilience Conservative County Conservative Forum (SRF). The SRF allows responders the opportunity to consult, collaborate and BHCC Councillors ESCC share information with each other to facilitate planning and response to emergencies. Deirdre Earl- John Barnes Peter Pragnell Williams Conservative Conservative Independent ESCC ESCC ESCC Sarah Osborne Philip Scott Phil Boorman Liberal Labour Conservative Democrat ESCC ESCC ESCC David Tutt Barry Taylor Andy Smith Liberal Conservative Conservative Democrat ESCC ESCC ESCC Page 4 Page 5 About East Sussex Fire and Rescue out of hours by on-call firefighters • 12 retained fire stations in our more rural areas, crewed by on-call firefighters who Service provide cover within their local area. We provide our services to approximately 840,000 people across East Sussex and the city The joint Sussex Control Centre for East and West Sussex Fire and Rescue Services, of Brighton and Hove. based at Haywards Heath, provides all the respective