Transcript

of the Authority Clerk. The meeting is being held at our Fire and Police shared headquarters here in Eastleigh. The meeting has been recorded for broadcast on the Authority's website and will be available for repeated viewing. The press and members of the public are also permitted to film and broadcast this meeting. Those remaining at the meeting are consenting to being filmed and recorded and the possible use of those images and recording for broadcasting purposes. Today there is no scheduled fire alarm test. In the event of the alarm sounding please leave the building by the nearest and safest fire exits. Follow officers who will guide you to the firemaster point in the car park. Members have microphones on the table in front of them to amplify voices for the broadcast and for our recording. You'll need to push the button to speak and please push the button again once you've finished speaking. So to begin today's agenda item I have to call for nominations to appoint a chairman for the current municipal year until the next annual general meeting of the Authority in

1. So first can I have any nominations for the role of chairman please. That's another ongoing deal. Brilliant born should be the chairman. And is there anyone able to second that nomination. That's Roger Price. Thank you. Are there any other nominations. Which case can I ask to show by a vote of show of hands a vote for really and born to be the chairman of Hampton on the right follow authority. That's unanimous. Thank you very much. OK. In which case the chairman would you like to take your seat. Thank you very much. Congratulations on the year and welcome. Thank you members. Thank you for your repeated confidence in me. I will do my best not to let you down and also more importantly the people of Hampshire and the other way because that's the reason we're here. So thank you. Thank you. Item two that is the election of a vice chairman. I would call for nominations for a chairman up until the end of 2025. I'd like to nominate Councillor Fran Carpenter please. OK. Is that seconded. Are there any other nominations. Thank you chairman. I'd like to nominate Councillor Roger Price. OK. Is that seconded OK. So votes for. Does it matter which order we take it in votes then for Fran please as vice chairman. You can vote for. And votes for Roger Price. It would seem that the votes for Fran have it. Fran congratulations. If you would like to come and sit here where your luggage is. OK. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Just like to say thank you to Zoe for the work she did in the role previously. And I hope I can match your thoroughness and diligence in that role. Thank you very much everybody. And also say thanks for me for your role in the role. Thank you. OK. I can three apologies for absence. I have PCC Donna Jones Karen Luciano and George matchwick. Anybody else. OK. Item four declarations of interest. Any. No. Item five the minutes of the last meeting of the authority on the twenty seventh of February. Does anyone have any points to raise on the minutes. So I can sign them. OK. Item six any deputations. No. Item seven chairman's announcement. Can I remind members that we still are under the rule general rules of election perter. Not that generally affects our operations here because we don't do politics. Welcome to our newest member of the far authority Stephen Parker. Stephen would you like to just say a few words about yourself. Thank you. I've been littering local government generally for an aggregate of 30 years. Firstly as a member of a London borough. Then as heart district council which I was for some time leader. Now the county council. And I'm delighted to join the fire authority. I think it's going to be a really interesting year or however many looking at and seeing how the fire authority works and doing my best to help them in the work they do to keep all our residents safe. So I'm delighted to be here. Thank you. And also welcome back to all existing members of the authority for another year of action packed business. Just a word on the retirement of Councillor Hugh Lumby. I'm sure you wish to join me in wishing you the best wishes for the future. He apparently now has completely lost his voice. But he has some sort of Dalek machine which works well. And he's been appointed in a role as a judge so he forges on in his chosen career. He's coming to have coffee with the chief and myself next month I think. So we can give him a present for his service and everything. So you know remarkable he seems to be doing very well. And there's always a role for him in Doctor Who. The next item, the retirement of Stu as our assistant, well he was actually in the role of deputy chief fire officer while Shantha was away. He is now on retirement leave. Chief, would you like to say anything? Yeah, just briefly. He officially leaves at the end of this month, very shortly he was on retirement leave now and couldn't be here today. But obviously he sends his regards to everybody and we certainly said our thanks to him. He'll be having a final sort of celebration of his career at St. Mary's Fire Station in the future with some teams there. But he'll be obviously missed by us all. He's been a really important member of our team for some time. And he'll go on to I'm sure other things and enjoy the rest of his career. We'll stay in touch and I'm sure he'll continue to support us from afar. Thank you. And the chief and I are meeting with him later in the summer to say thanks. But a good time to welcome Rob Cole in the role of assistant chief fire officer. Most of you will know Rob. He's been around for a long time. Rob, many congratulations on your appointment. Service support for the D-Day events, which everybody I'm sure took a part in. The teams across the service worked as part of a multi-agency group to ensure that there was a joint understanding of potential risks for the D-Day event and put in place plans and resources to deal with any arising incidents. On the day, all agencies involved worked together to ensure continued effective communication and the ability to quickly implement a coordinated response should the need arise. The service resource multiple helicopter landing sites for the royal family and VIPs. It also resource fire cover, bronze, silver and gold commands and on standby specialist teams to provide medical care if needed. I'd like to thank all those involved from behind the scene efforts to support the safe running of this event, which I think was enormously well received by everybody. Fantastic. Makes you proud to be British. Community development and safeguarding manager, you will have seen that Paul Francis, the service community development safeguarding manager, was awarded a British Empire medal in the king's birthday honors recently for his service to public safety. Many of you will know Paul and like me, be delighted that his hard work and dedication to safeguarding others has been recognized with this honor. And I wrote on behalf of the authority to him to say congratulations and to wear his medal with pride. I think that from the general public's perspective is they very rarely see what the fire service or fire authority service is doing in supporting those sort of events. They're in the background and they're there very much needed and very much there should anything happen. It doesn't, thank goodness, but they're there supporting it and all the work that goes in in planning what should happen, if anything does happen, what they should do and what have you. And from the public's point of view, they never see any of that. So the service never gets the congratulations. And I think we should put on record congratulations to the service in being there and doing what they would probably see as their normal job. But it's a little bit more than a normal job on those days when you had such very important people there. You raise a good point. Can PR and governance produce something to that effect about how much goes into it? Put them on the case. Thank you. Good point, Roger. Women in the Fire Service Award nominations. A number of our staff have been nominated for Women in the Fire Service Awards 2024. These awards recognize the outstanding contribution and achievement of individuals within the fire and rescue sector, highlighting their dedication, leadership and impact. Crew manager Beth Medway from South Sea Fire Station has been nominated for the Bright Light Award for organizing the annual Senior Citizens Showcase event at Portsmouth Guildhall, which entertains and engages an audience in excess of 350 people. Instead of inclusion and organizational development, Annie Pratt was nominated for the Danny Cotton Inspiring Leader Award for her dedication and leadership, which has led to the development of a specialist team and internal equality, diversity and inclusion governance framework within the last 12 months. And watch manager Joshua Cain from the Fire Cadets Team was nominated for the Youth Inspirational Award for his active support of others and leading by example, despite facing personal challenges, crew manager Aimee Beams in the Southeast Regional Representative for Women in the Fire Service UK. Chief, any comments? Actually, Annie's here with us today, so congratulations Annie for your nomination. And it's great to see so many of our fantastic staff being recognized nationally for their work to support women in the fire service. So it's a great organization and we do support it and it just gives people a voice and we learn a great deal from others as well at the same time. It's good to be supporting of that. Thank you. Next up, we hosted the Her Majesty's Inspector of Constabulary Fire and Rescue Services Board and the Chief Inspector in May. They came here to spend the day with us, which I thought was an excellent event. I mean, it was -- you almost didn't have the threat that they were looking at us. Of course, they were looking at us, but it was a much more relaxed event than we sort of have previously. Would you not agree, Chief? I would. It was a delight to host them. And just to understand some of their pressures as an Inspector, because they were quite keen to understand a daily kind of living in an authority like ours and how they can familiarize themselves further with fire and rescue. Obviously, with Shanta's comment over the last year, it was a perfect segue in her comment coming to an end and our understanding about the Board and making those relationships now before we face our own inspection in the new year. Thanks. Thank you. Next item, we hosted Shireen Wheeler, who is the new Chief Executive of the Firefighters' Charity here, or rather Shanta did. So Shanta, would you like to comment? Yes. So Shireen has taken over from Dr. Jill Tolfrey, who is the Chief Executive for some decades with the charity, keen to get around different services and just understand the sector more. And so, yeah, she very much enjoyed her time with us. And obviously, we support the charity hugely amongst our various teams. Good. Thank you. Thank you. Moving on to Item 8 on the agenda, member developments. Over to you. How have you developed yourself? Thank you, Chairman. I like to think I've developed myself a little bit over the last couple of months or so. One of the outstanding highlights for me was attending the volunteers' evening. And, you know, it dawned on me some time ago just how important volunteers are as part of the Fire Service. You know, there's such a range of people that devote themselves or commit their time to assist us in our objectives, often helping young people. Sometimes it's ex-firefighters. Sometimes it's people that have never previously been employed by the Fire Service. But I think it's something like 10,000 hours that they've contributed to over a period of 12 months or so. It's enormously important. And I think that one evening is an inspiration to everybody who attends. And it's that one opportunity that we get in a year to acknowledge their contribution. Beyond that, I've done a bit of equality and diversity training in common with other members, which I enjoyed. And I also attended the graduation service for new firefighters, which, again, was quite thrilling to watch. And, you know, when you see people starting their careers with maybe 30 or 40 years ahead of them, we all wish them very well. But it's a lovely occasion to be at. Thank you, Chairman. Thank you, David. I, too, would like to add to that. I was at both those events. And the volunteers evening was -- I mean, it's just so warming. It really boosts your heart, because of the effort they put into it. And we owe them an awful lot. It was so nice to see Karen Farr there as well, sporting her MBE, which was richly deserved. And the graduation parade is always a highlight. You know, it's an atmosphere which is largely created by the friends and family and people who come who, really, they generate it to such a high degree. You can certainly feel it up in the front. And if you could hear it, I think it would sound like popcorn going off, if you could hear it. But it really is a great day to go to. So those of you who haven't been to one recently, do come. Anybody else done anything interesting? Sally. Thank you, Chair. On the 26th of April, I went to St. Mary's Fire Station for a Prince's Trust event. They were on a five-day crash course. I think there was eight young people there. I spoke to one mum who said she was just proud of her son for just putting on the demonstration because he suffers really badly with anxiety. So, yeah, to see the mum being really proud of her son doing it, it was a great demo. I'm always fascinated by the demos. I love watching them. But, yeah, to learn it all in five days was pretty amazing. But that's all I've done, unfortunately, because we had elections in the city. So I was quite tied up with that. So boring, isn't it? Well done. Anybody else? David. Yes, thank you, Chairman. I'm just picking up on what happened on the 16th of May. This was the graduation. As ever, a brilliant event. I actually spent quite a bit of time talking to some of the parents and guardians and families of those who are graduating. And they are proud as punch to see their friends and their family graduate. And you can tell that by chatting with them. And I encourage everyone who does go along to take the time to talk to the families because I think it means a lot to them, for someone from the fire authority, as well as, you know, within the organization, when we come along and have a chat to find out about them and to answer. Because they're just so delighted. And that was a great pleasure. And also, I didn't get along to the volunteers' conference, but I do know with another hat of the Hampshire and Isle of Wight air ambulance, when we have a volunteers' conference, the value that we as an organization, and obviously here as well, put in the volunteers who actually step up and make a brilliant contribution. And I think to show that they are valued is crucial as well. So well done for coming on. I shall make a note of doing that next time if I have that opportunity, Chairman. That's all for me. Great. Thank you. Anybody? Roger? A couple of things. I attended during May the EDI Champions Network in London of our teams. And that was a very interesting gain of what is going on and what is trying to be done within the services nationally. And the other one was the Fire Service Management Committee on the 17th of May, just trying to refresh my memory of the agenda. And there was nothing really on it, because the meeting was over very quickly. I think everyone wanted to get away, because I think things were starting to happen around about that time. The other thing I would like to say is -- this is more of a difficult one for me -- is that I went to a funeral of ex-Chief's wife, and unfortunately, I wasn't very well in halfway through the service. I was sat next to somebody from Urban Search and Rescue. He said, Are you okay? I said, No, I need to get out. And he took me outside, and Rob took over from there. And, Rob, I can't commend him enough for what he did. I have had two sessions before that occasion of passing out, and I think I nearly passed out on that occasion. I don't really know what happened, but I cannot commend enough of what the service medical people did for me that day. Rob was leading, and there were others doing all that they needed to do around me. They were superb. We hear about the service medical and what they do. I've experienced it. You cannot get better than what they did for me on that day. And I would thank them very much publicly. Roger, thank you. Thank you for that. And well done, Rob. It's important that we keep these people alive, because we have to be corred. Thank you, Roger. Chief. Well, firstly, an excellent outcome. Thank you. Give us a run for our money, I think, Roger, but thank you and great to see you in Feinfelter today. I just wanted to go back to your reason for being at the funeral action. It's worth mentioning Silver Eastwood, and I think Malcolm, one of the previous fire chiefs here, Silver was an amazing help to Hampshire, as it was Hampshire Fire Service over the years. So it probably is right and proper that we just put on record our thanks and memory of her as well and the efforts she's gone through over the years for supporting so many people across the service. And thank you, Roger, for attending the funeral and being there for us. Any more? Derek, please. Thank you, Chair. I notice in the illustrious row behind me, there's a lady called Annie Brown. I don't think you introduced at the start of the event. I notice you're head of inclusion in organizational development, and as you've probably seen, everybody's been mentioning EDI, which I presume comes under your brief now. So I'd like to welcome you if the chairman has not. I think we all know that. I do apologize. Okay. I was looking at the notes at the time. Apologies, but welcome anyway. Yes, I, too, went on additional EDI training and another source, which was very interesting to compare with the EDI, totally different EDI training that we had here. So that was my main thing. Of course, I attended the firefighters' graduation. We've got a couple of cadet graduations coming up in the next month or so. Other than that, relatively quiet. There is an election on, so Roger tells me. Thanks, Chair. Thank you, Derek. Zoe. Thank you, Chair. Yes, I, too, went to the graduation. Roger and I also met with the performance team. I also met with Children and Young People's team to discuss some of the new programs. There's one in particular called Impact that's been rolling out in Gosport, which is their school engagement program, so engaging those that for some reason have low attendance at school, so reengaging them in a program. I have their graduation on Friday also to attend. But I'd also like to probably thank the crew that supported the large domestic fire that happened in Gosport last week. Thankfully, there were only minor injuries, so the response time was fantastic. Unfortunately, three houses were severely had fire damage, but I think more importantly, as well as a thank you, is to also highlight then the safety advice that you've then published subsequently regarding lithium batteries and storage of scooters. So I think we need to continue to highlight that, but thank you. The LGA fire training, and it's completely free to members. It's really for members only here. 29th and 30th of October in Warwick, and it's subsidised completely accommodation, food, everything. So I just thought you might like to know about that and sign on if you're interested, especially new members might be interested. Good, good. Thank you. Thank you very much. You've all got the program of events coming up well into next year. I just think it's important that an authority member is actually at all of these events. I mean, we can't do them all. And also, if you let governance know that you are going to go, that helps, doesn't it? Because then they can put you on the batting order and give you the information that will help you at that meeting. Thank you, Chairman, and good morning, members. So the report to item nine is the usual report that comes to the authorities annual meeting each June. You'll all probably know the appointments from the constituents authorities to the fire authority are confirmed each year at the constituents authorities annual general meeting. So that process has taken place. The composition of the authority is now shown at appendix one to the report. The political balance of the authority hasn't changed since last year. So the proposed proportionality table at appendix two to the report is the same as last year with the same allocation of seats to committees. So as part of the recommendations, the authority will be asked to approve that allocation of seats and confirm which members are appointed to each of the committees. The report goes on at paragraph 19 to deal with the current appointments to the pension board. Members are asked to note those appointments but also that there are two vacancies which are in the process of being filled and we will come back to a future authority meeting to deal with those appointments. The report also then covers a number of other appointments on matters to note at paragraph 20 A to G and are set out in the recommendations. Then paragraphs 21 and 22 deal with the usual standard dispensations that the authority has agreed for a number of years now, just to avoid any potential issues relating to members' interests in land and the members' allowance scheme. And again, the recommendations ask the authority to confirm their agreement to those dispensations as in previous years. Paragraph 24 sets out the authority's schedule of meetings for the year ahead and asks the authority to approve that at appendix 3. And then finally, the report asks the authority to approve some minor changes to the pension board's terms of reference which have been considered by the pension board itself. The changes are largely administrative in nature and they clarify some of the defined terms, bring references to officers' roles up to date and reflect requirements on pension board members to declare interest. So nothing of substance in terms of the operation of the pension board but some technical administrative changes. So those amendments are set out at appendix 5 and the authority has asked to approve those amendments in the recommendation. So that's probably all I need to say but happy to take any questions. It's not so much a question, it's just if it can be added in because it was missed out on point 10 and point 20C where it mentions the minority group spokesman for the Liberal Democrats and Independent. Can Labour be put in there please? Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Any more questions for Paul? Roger. Mr Chairman, I've got problems with some of the dates for the fire authority meeting, the October and the February one. I have problems over, I won't be able to attend either of those. But I'm wondering whether, because this is the first time we see the dates, whether it's possible to bring them forward a week in those two instances. Also the Firefighters Pension Board is down here on the 23rd of July 24. That has actually already been changed to the 13th of August 24. I think it's had about three or four attempts of getting the right date to meet for that one. I think that is the latest date that's been agreed. We'll capture that in a minute. I think the paper was probably published before that date was finalized. Yes, it was. And the two on the 3S fire one, because of the dates of the other two, they're the same dates, they usually follow the fire authority meetings, also caused me a problem. Would you like to speak to Paul and Katie and try and sort that out? Yes. Because they have the list of available dates anyway, so if I can leave it as a joint effort. Yes, that's fine. I mean the scope obviously for the authority to vary the dates of meetings, so we'll liaise and try and find a suitable answer. Okay, good. Thank you. Anybody else? So if we go to the recommendations, I'm just searching for a bit of paper which I thought I had. Carry on. The recommendations said on page 11 that the authority approves the current schedule of meetings of the authority and its committee for the coming year. Well, on hold, I think, as a result of that last one. Five, that for the purposes of part one of the Local Government and Housing Act, 1989, the authority agrees to the allocation of seats on the standard and governance committee and the stakeholder committee of the authority be set out as appendix two. Are we okay with that? Great. Yes, well, it will be if the authority, future authority agrees to those recommendations, so that's still, I think, working its way through, but that's currently the thinking, so it may well change. Currently, though, it is still standards and governance committee. Okay. All right. There's a few, I have raised it. There are a few grammatical anomalies in these recommendations. I take item six, for instance. The authority is a single entity, so it should read the authority appoints. No, that's not appoint. I mean, if it's we, the authority, that is plural. So it changes every time around. So, I mean, eight is correct, the authority agrees. Nine is not correct, the authority appoints, it should be appoints. If we can tidy that up, that would be helpful. Yes, Chairman, we'll do better next time with the grammar. I just raised the issue, so, you know, I do read these things. It is. Okay. So eight, the authority appoints members of the standard and governance committee and stakeholder committee and their respective chairman and vice chairman following the agreed allocation of seats as at paragraph five. Yeah. I mean, I don't propose to change any of the appointments that we have, apart from what we've done already. Chairman, we do need to just capture who is appointed. So if we're keeping the members as per the previous, we can capture that if that's agreed by members. Shall we capture it? I did have a bit of paper saying all the way around, but I can't find it. Have you got any more? It's probably sufficient if none of the previous appointments are changing. Well, on standards and governance, Councillor Lumby has gone, so I think I'll put in Zoe in his place. But otherwise, as before. 3S5, the same as they were last year. Yeah. Okay. So seven with regard to the pensions board, the authority considers the position as set out in paragraph 19 of the report and approves the appointment as set out. Yep. The authority agrees that APAG includes all appointed authority members as set out in paragraph 20A of the report until the AGM for next year. Yep. The authority appoints three members and identify one of these as chairman to an informal working party of the principal officers pay review group, as detailed in paragraph 20B of the report until next year's AGM. And those three members are Derek Miller, Roger Price and as before. I'm Derek Miller. The minority group spokesman for the Liberal Democrat and Independent group is confirmed until the annual report next year, which is Roger. Labor added in. Sorry. 11 the authority that the current appointments of the independent person for the authority has referred to in paragraph 20 D. Happy that the authority agrees that the chairman of the stakeholder committee be appointed as shareholder representative of for three S fire CIC pursuant to article 42 of the articles of association of three S fast CIC as set out in paragraph 20E of the report until the annual meeting next year. Yep. 13 that the authority grants dispensation on the section 32 to a and D of the localism act 2011 expiring on 30th of June 2025 in respect of provisions of section 31 for a and B of the localism act a to all members to enable them to participate in vote in any business of the authority relating to the setting of council tax or precepts when they would otherwise be prevented from so doing in consequence of a beneficial interest in land within the administrative area of the authority and to all members in receipt of an allowance under the authorities membership allowance scheme or another authority member allowance scheme enabling them to participate and vote in any business of the authority where they may otherwise be prevented from doing so in consequence of being in receipt of a member's allowance. Yep. It's the green book one. Yeah. 14 that the authority notes the updated members allowance scheme as set out in appendix for 15 that the authority approves the proposed changes to the pension boards terms of reference as set out in appendix five. Okay. Chairman, can we just clarify for the minutes the, um, appointments and particularly appointments of chair and vice chair for the standards and governance committee and the, uh, stakeholder committee. So I think we didn't quite standards and governance chairman is Derek Miller and vice chair is David Harrison and three S far is your chairman and the vice chairman is me. Okay. I just put in a request that we put all the names in a grid before this meeting. So we're all absolutely clear because I know it'll come out in the wash and we've got the chairs and vice chairs, but I think it would be helpful to have those. We don't always know when to come in the room. It's your choice. Not ours. Of course. But if we've got, if we've got, um, or a blank sheet that we fill in, I think that would also help. We did have it. I mean, I think I had it in front of me. All the things. Trust me. Trust you implicitly. Yes. After the induction session, um, this afternoon or members will receive a member's handbook and it will all be in the member's handbook for you. I'll be an electronic handbook that you received and if it helps, Katie has just captured what we believe to be the position. So she can just confirm that this is the members handbook where it already is in. Yeah, I wasn't making it up. But a point well made. Right. Are we happy with that? So that then concludes item nine. Moving on to item 10. Uh, the upturn report on page 37 of your paperwork, and I would invite Catherine Edge come to go through this paper, please. Good morning, members. So I'm pleased to present the upturn report for the previous financial year 2023 24. And so a very short summary of the position is it's a largely business as usual report for the last year. But there are also some looks towards the future within this report, which show a more challenging position and developing in this year and from 25 26 onwards. And so what I'll do is I'll run through some of the key points from the report, but obviously very happy to take questions at the end. So paragraph 8 to 14 talk about the revenue budget position for the year, and it is an underspend of five 562,000 pounds with a full breakdown in the table in paragraph eight. Um, so it's pleasing to note that that's roughly in line with the position that's been presented throughout the majority of the year. And paragraph nine provides some more detail of the various under and overspends on the different budget lines. Um, from paragraph, paragraph 11 to 14, um, outline some proposed budget transfers and in line with the constitution and these budget transfers need to be approved by the authority. So the authority approves any transfers that create permanent that change what was originally approved. Um, if it's more than 200,000 pounds or that create any additional pay budgets. So the budget changes in paragraph 11 are as a result of the, um, refocusing operations program and just show some realignment of budgets between and the whole time firefighters and staff, including fire control and also a small realignment between the operations directorate and the corporate services directorate and paragraph 12 outlines a proposal to bring the current grounds maintenance service, which is outsourced back in house. And so there's no change the overall budget. There's just a proposal to move the budget from purchased services into in house. Um, so converting budget to pay and there's a similar proposal for, um, some training delivered by the people and organizational development directorate where it's been identified that it was, it's more represents better value for money to deliver this training in house rather than outsourced. So paragraph 14 asked for approval and to transfer budget from non pay to pay budgets of 166,000 pounds. Um, paragraph 15 onwards talks about, um, the request to carry forward some funding from the previous financial year. And so this is something that we tend to do where expenditure was originally envisaged to be in the previous year, but for a variety of reasons needs to be carried forward into the next year. And these carry forward requests were provisionally approved by the chairman of the authority to allow us to continue with the work. And so these figures are included within the presentation within the report. So paragraph 18 onwards takes a forward look at the revenue budget for 25 and primarily from 25, 26 onwards. So those who are on the authority in February will remember that we talked about a forecast 4 million pound budget gap from financial year 25, 26 onwards. And I feel like everyone must be quite bored of me saying this, but obviously that is a forecast based gap based on a series of assumptions about future costs and funding. So as ever, it's quite difficult to forecast future funding. However, since then there has been a fairly significant development and the gray book. So firefighters pay award and that from July 2020 for onwards was higher than had been assumed within the figures in the budget report. So the budget report had assumed a 3% pay award and the pay award was actually awarded at 4%, but there was also a significant increase on the retainer paid to on firefighters, which takes effect from the 1st of January, 2025. So the impact of this pay award has, has been, is that the forecast budget cap increases from 4 million pounds to 6 million pounds from 25, 26 onwards. So as set out in the budget report in February, it's clear that the service needs to take action to bridge this gap. And so, um, therefore, uh, a fire futures board chaired by the chief fire officer has been set up to make sure that we can deliver savings to bridge the gap and also to make sure that the savings, um, are in line with our other important streams of work, such as a community risk management plan work and regular authorities will be regular updates will be provided to the authority about the progress on this work and, and anything obviously that involves an authority decision will also be brought back as a separate paper to the authority. So paragraphs 24 to 30 deal with the previous year's capital expenditure. And I think it's really pleasing to see here the excellent progress that has been made on the delivery of the capital program. So 26 million pounds worth of capital spend was delivered during the year. And what's really positive about this is that the service is starting to benefit from some of these investments and from some of the work that's been planned for several years. So during the past year, the new live fire training facility was completed and is now in use and significant progress on the scheme at caution was delivered alongside, um, other more minor works such as sprinklers in the fleet maintenance center, electric vehicle charging points and carbon reduction measures. So, um, you can see in the table in paragraph 27, a more detailed breakdown of, um, of the spend that has occurred in the previous year. And as the authority, as people who've been on the authority for some time will remember, um, 37 million pounds worth of the capital program is to be funded from credential borrowing. And, um, during the previous financial year, the first loan was taken out as part of this fund at this borrowing requirement. So during the year, a 10 million pound loan was taken out as detailed in paragraph 29. Um, the funding for repaying that loan is already built into the budget. So that's the start of this borrowing, but there is still a remaining 27 million pounds of borrowing still to do. So paragraph 31 to 34 talks about the authority's, um, position on its prudential indicators and capital investment strategy. So this is probably one of the more technical parts of the report, but I think as the authority borrows more money, it is important to know that these, these figures become more important. And, um, the authority should place sort of greater focus on some of these amounts of money as our borrowing requirement as we actually start to take out some of this borrowing. So, um, it's pleasing to note that the authority has continued to comply with the prudential indicators, um, during 23, 24. And you can see here, um, there's a little table about the authorized limit of debt being 41.4 million pounds, whereas against our total debt currently of 15.6 million pounds. So this is just an important indicator for the authority, um, which we presented quarterly throughout the year. So paragraph 35 onwards is a forward look at the capital program. Um, there are just some minor amendments that are set out in appendix B one and confidential appendix B two. And they just reflect some minor changes to the capital program and paragraph 36 I think is a helpful chart summarizing how we're actually spending and how we're spending the capital programs. You can see the estate being the largest items with vehicles coming a close second and smaller amounts on carbon reduction and some revenue commitments. Um, it's also worth noting that in paragraph 38, there are still some pressures on the capital program. For example, um, there's still, there is still some inflation particularly affecting the construction sector. So although while, um, general inflation in the economy is slowing, we're still seeing some, um, significant pressure there and interest rates continue to be higher than they have been in the past. So, um, that continues to present a risk. Um, also we're, we're aware that there are some items that will need to be included within the capital program that haven't yet been scoped and costed such as, um, further work on fire contaminants and particularly other works on the estates, particularly these cows site. And paragraph 38 covers provisions, um, which are just amounts set aside in the accounts for things which are of uncertain value and timing. And then, um, paragraph 40 onwards talks about the authorities reserves and balance sheet. So, um, reserves have continued to reduce, um, which is in line with the authorities plans. So in 21, 22 reserves reached a historic high for the fire authority and they've continued to reduce, um, largely due to excellent progress in delivering the capital program. Um, so in the course of the year as set out in paragraph 43, there's been a net reduction in reserves of 6.7 million. It's just worth drawing the authorities attention to the fact that, um, actual reserve usage was nearly 18 million pounds, but we do continue to contribute to reserves. So the net position is a reduction of 7 million. So it's, it's just worth noting that these aren't in effect a pot of money which will one day run out. It's the money that we are, we'll reduce, but we're also replenishing the reserves alongside using them. Um, paragraph 44 shows the reduction in reserve balances. So we're at, um, at the 31st of the third, 24, the balance had reduced and we are forecasting it to reduce further in future years, but that is all in line with the plan strategy. And then the final part I wanted to draw your attention to is paragraphs 49 to 54, which is just a brief update on the position of our, on our statement of accounts and external audit. So the authority is required to publish a statement of accounts by the 31st of May, 2024. Um, um, this is to allow for the period of public inspection. And we did comply with that deadline. So the draft accounts were published on the 31st of May,
2. Um, as reported to the standards and governance committee, the audit of the 2022-23 accounts hasn't yet commenced and is now not going to take place. So the 2022-23 accounts will be given a disclaimed opinion, which, um, is due to the fact that the audit hasn't taken place rather than to do with any issues for what was found in the accounts. And we will be make sure that it's very clear in that opinion, that it's due to a national issue about a short shortage of auditor resources rather than anything local for the fire authority. So we're still anticipating that the 23-24 audit will take place, and that will, um, commence shortly. And we're anticipating meeting the statutory deadline for the audit of the 23-24 accounts. It's just a more complicated process because normally the auditors can place reliance on the previous year, whereas the previous year wasn't completed. Um, so that was all I wanted to highlight from the report, but obviously very happy to take any questions. Thank you. Thank you. Members. Roger. Thank you. Um, Catherine, um, I did warn you about this, this question to start with, um, on page 39 and, uh, nine G supplies and services, 811, um, 0.811 million pounds overspent on the airwave, uh, backdated airwave cost. I'm very much aware that airwave, um, is changing nationally because of the, uh, way the government has set up the new scheme. And I understand the new scheme is going to be very costly anyway. So what is overspent here? And because it's the old scheme still. So I really want to understand why, because is it on the usage basis of a charged or do it as an annual charge for really want to get to get behind what it is. So, um, the charging, so the whole overspend isn't, isn't a result of the airwave radios, but it is a significant proportion of the spend. The charging of airwaves is quite complex and some of this overspend relates to, um, some backdated charging in effect where the home office undercharge services in previous years. So there has been a catch up of charging. Um, in the draft accounts, there is a provision and there's a contingent asset listed as there has been a competitions and markets authorities case going on surrounding airwave radios. And there has been a provisional decision that there will be a refund from the supplier to fire and rescue authorities. So this overspend could be offset partly by that refund. It's just that because that, um, overspend is still that the, um, the case is still making its way through the courts. We haven't yet recognized that income, but we are anticipating possibly receiving some refund income as a result of a competition and markets authority decision. But this all relates to the, um, the legacy airwave system progress on the emergency services network future system is currently, as far as I'm aware, stalled. So, um, this, this there isn't that we haven't yet seen really any costs come through for that other than the preparatory work, which we've been doing, which is funded by grant. So my other question is that, um, on capital borrowing, because interest rates are high at the moment, um, normally we borrow over a longer period. Are we borrowing on under short periods and then re borrowing after that period? Or can we get such good interest rate, um, deals that it has to be a long term? How are we, we coping with the interest rates they are at the moment? So that's a really good question and a focus of quite a lot of my time at the moment. So we're working closely with our treasury advisors to help understand the best approach to borrowing. Um, the loan we took out was over 13 years, but involved, um, repayment of the loan during that period. One of our key priorities is to make sure that we manage the maturity of our borrowing so that what we don't want is 37 million pounds worth of borrowing to all mature on the same day. Because if, if then interest rates are better, we're all seeing a great position, but if they're not, then that would be very risky. But that's a big part of our challenge at the moment to make sure that we are borrowing with a good mixture of the lowest cost, but also we really, we can't expose ourselves to interest rate fluctuations. So all of our borrowing will be done over a longer period of time. It's just exactly the longest we could borrow for is 50 years. So it's a, it's the question of balancing affordability and value for money against the certainty which longer term borrowing provides us. So, um, I think to answer your question more simply, we have borrowed over a long, a longer period, but not as long as we could. But unfortunately, if we could predict interest rates, we would, um, I think we'll be in a better financial position. Thank you. Uh, one, one comment and then a question on the comment is, again, I'm quite concerned that, um, we now get a deficit of six million or projected six million and we're looking at savings. I accept that we've always got to be looking at savings and seeing where we can save money and making sure we're finding the best we can for what money we have. But it worries me that by these sort of figures that we will have to cut to the extent that the service level will go down. And that's just a general comment that worries me that the service will go down in what we're being able to provide because be quite blunt government of the day, whatever the color of it is, is not providing us with the money that is needed. That's the real problem. Um, which we're trying to save money when, you know, it doesn't seem right to me. Um, that's a comment. The other one is on page 30, so 48, 39B. I don't understand because holiday pay is an automatic thing. As you get paid for, it's back dated holiday pay. And, um, I mean every employee everywhere, I don't know where you work. Um, when you take your holidays, you get paid. And I don't understand what this is. So I should endeavor to explain it and then hopefully Annie can tell me whether I've got this right or not. So for our, um, on call firefighters who, um, they, they're retaining fee covers their pay and they can take leave and they continue to receive that retainer for the, for example, the activity they do when they go out on shouts and when they do their training, um, that is paid in effect on a pay as you go basis. So, and in the past that pay as you go basis didn't include any kind of allowance for holiday pay. So the law changed to suggest that then, um, you would receive a slightly higher rate of pay to cover the fact that when you're not working, you're not attending those incidents. So it's the bit of holiday pay you're getting for the pay as you go work. So, um, basically that the rate of pay increases slightly to take into the account the fact that you don't get paid for that work when you're not there. Does that make sense? I think I'm following you. It's just that, um, I think it's because for, for people who are on a sort of an annual salary that's regular every month, you take two weeks off work and then you, you get paid, you continue to get paid. But if actually sort of say 70% of your pay is for pay as you go activities, when you're not there for those two weeks, you don't continue to get paid for that work. So we pay or we've increased all of your pay slightly to make up for the fact that you're missing that holiday pay as a result of a legislative change. Very complicated. It is. It is a very, it's a very complicated calculation and, but it is, um, it's a legal change rather than anything we've done. Sorry. So you like occur that it's so many hours you work, you then get a holiday pay. So like, I don't know, you work a day and a half and you get so many hours holiday pay, but instead of taking the holiday as holiday pay, it just goes in your wages. Okay. Derek, well, first of all, I'd like to think Catherine there as ever, we get super about turn reports and I don't think any accounting report would ever give the detail. We could ever expect the detail that's contained here. I'm more concerned actually to the future. You cover the futures board. Is it fire futures board? You cover very early on in the paper. Um, Rogers just touched on this. We've got a 4 million shortfall. Only about 20 million is of our total budget is not affected by pay payroll situations. In other words, you're going to have to be looking irrespective of inflation, borrowing costs, et cetera, for about a 25% cut to make a budget. Um, do you really think this is feasible? Sorry, chief. I probably should be asking. No, I don't. It's probably for the both of us really, but I mean, what I would say the fire futures program is really about making sure we go through that process of seeing what's feasible, what's doable, um, taking both your points in mind. And I suspect the point of the question, um, if we get to a stage where we have to affect the service to the community, then clearly it will come here for decisions. And at this stage, I mean, bear in mind we can describe as 6%, essentially a 6% reduction in, in our revenue funding. Uh, and, uh, we're looking into that and kind of a household budget where there's a fair bit of tightening you've got to do, but nonetheless it's doable. So this stage it feels doable and we'll be looking at everything and we've included our staff in a conversation about what it might be and how the things we can change. Uh, but I don't at this stage, um, want to include the reductions in service to the community. I think we must turn every stone over in terms of efficiency and driving those things first. And I believe there's a fair bit we can do there. We know we can do more there. Uh, it's been pointed out by the HMI and others. Um, so we'll go there first. And, uh, obviously then as Catherine said in her report, there'll be regular updates back to the authority about progress and probably informally in APAC as well about the things, you know, the kind of types of things we're looking at. Just to give you some sort of assurance about where we're looking, where we're not looking. Um, in the future, this continues to make them more, the broader point about sort of lobbying. Uh, there'll be a time for a CSR comprehensive spending review for government to consider whichever flavor of government we have. And I seriously think the fire sector should be making a strong case for the ongoing demands, the ongoing pressure on our budgets because this were to continue to become really quite difficult for us to sustain a viable organization. This stage we're not in that, in that place as well as we can see. And I think Catherine would attest to that also. Catherine, do you have something to add? Um, yeah, just to sort of follow up on that, I think, um, it's, it's just really important to note that what we're looking to do is deliver these 6 million pound savings to keep us in a strong financial position. So we want to be able to continue to put money. Yeah. Um, yeah, it's increased unfortunately, but we want to continue to be able to put money aside so that we can invest, for example, in our estate. Um, if we didn't want to take a longterm view in line with the authority's principles, if we went against that, we could just stop contributing to reserves, balance the budget that way. But then we would be in an incredibly difficult position when it comes to refreshing all of our operational equipment and for dealing with what we know is a significant amount of work that needs to be done in the future on the estate. So we need to make these savings to keep us in a strong position. You're transferring some under spends into reserve. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So um, so it's, it's to keep us in a strong position. We're not talking about, um, being at anywhere near any kind of financial cliff edge. We want to keep ourselves in the good position that we're in. Members, any more questions? Catherine. Thank you. Very complete and complex report. If we can move to page 37 for the recommendations, which are that the Hampshire and Isle of Wight fire and rescue full authority approves, splitting the underspend of 0.562 million and its addition to the transformation reserve 50% and the capital payment reserve 50% to fund future priorities of the authority as set out in paragraph 42 and update is provided on balances held across all reserves at the end of 23, 24. Next, the environment set out in paragraph 11 to 14 and finally the updated capital capital program as shown in appendix B one and exempt appendix B two. Do we agree? Okay. Catherine, thank you. Moving now to item 11, which is the annual performance report on page 77 of your paperwork. And I would invite Matt Robinson to Robinson to introduce this report. Please. Thank you Chairman. Good morning members. So this is the annual performance report for the service which runs from April 2023 through to March 2024. March just gone. And so this is the second full year report, which we have followed this format in. Um, and the main difference for the two reports in terms of format is that we've added areas of notable practice throughout this, um, throughout this report. So showcasing to yourselves and the public some of the good work done across, across our teams. If I draw your attention to the appendix, so that's from page 83, I'll just talk you through, uh, some of the highlights of it. Um, on page 86, just a piece of a structure. So it's in three parts. This report, the first part looks at the safety plan improvement activities, which the authority approved for last year just gone. So it provides an update on progress against those, uh, the middle section part two and talks about that performance over the last 12 months. And then the third part, three looks ahead. So that just summarizes the curious of focus for the current year that we're in now. So running from now through to, uh, March 2025 in terms of the safety plan. Then, so on page 88 and 89 of your packs, safety plan activities to be delivered during year four and there were 15 activities which the authority tasked the service to complete 13 of those have been fully completed and two are being carried through into the current years. Those two are, um, aligning a work to national operational guidance. So that is ongoing and it's a large piece of work and the team continue to work through that. So we run that forward for, uh, the current year. And then the second one carried forward was embedding the learning from the Grenfell phase two report. However, that phase two inquiry report, um, has not yet been published. Uh, I think a recent announcement says that it could be September, 2024. So, um, obviously once we have that report, we'll be able to then read timeline, uh, that activity. Uh, but the moment has been carried forward intersection two and looking at our performance and you'll see a summary of it on page nine of your packs and, but just a little bit more detail for you. Page 10 in terms of incidents at the year 23, 24 saw roughly a 3% reduction in incident volumes. So just over 20,000 incidents responded by the service. And so that's a slight reduction, say about 3%. The main reason for that reduction when you're looking year on year is that fires were quite a bit less of 26% less fires. And that's driven largely by the volume of outdoor fires that we saw back in 2022, which is the year we're comparing this with, which we didn't really see the same summer heat waves in the summer last year. So that has meant the reduction in fires. Co-responder calls you can see on the graph on page 10, um, reduced by 11%, though it is worth noting that we do still continue to do more corresponding cause than, uh, than similar services in our family group. We also have a plan to try and increase the number of people that carry out this dedicated role and we continue to work with, um, south central ambulance and to look at overall co-responder availability and how we build that and going forward. False alarms you'll see there in the sort of purple blue color at the bottom of those bar charts, um, continue to increase. So they see an 8% increase and overall alarm numbers from the previous year. Um, and you can see that sort of increase over the last few years in the graph response times, um, on page 12, very similar, um, uh, response time in our critical response at seven minutes and 42 seconds. So it's a one second slower than the previous year. And there's been, however, a slight but a notable increase in on call availability, which is 2% higher. So it's currently at 61%. Um, and so that's obviously clearly really, um, really good to see. It's also important to note and the bottom part of page 12 that our response time performance, um, is, uh, faster than, um, other services in our family group. And that's for primary fires, which is defined as the text in the green box on the bottom right of that page. So we're still performing very strongly when you look nationally, um, on page 13, uh, bottom of page, sorry, on page 96 of your packs, page 13 of the appendix on call availability. So as I said, there's a 2% increase, which is good local recruitment challenges, however, and still occur across some stations. And these clearly have a big impact on the overall average that you're seeing there on the 61, we continue to undertake range of activity to further support on call staff and improve availability. And the 2% increase in that year accounts around 10,000 hours. So 10,000 additional hours of availability, which equates to just over, um, one more on call appliance being available than the previous year. So, um, so an insignificant, uh, achievement page 97 fire fatalities and casualties. And we have in the, in the year we're talking about here, seeing some positive reductions in our fire fatalities and casualty figures. And again, we compare well to similar services in terms of lower, uh, lower rates and also on the casualty rates, less severe and consequences of, of those who find themselves and needing assistance. In addition to these figures, the service also internally scrutinizes data on casualties and fatalities. And however, these often do relate to special service calls, which are things like low traffic collisions, um, or affecting entry into properties, which our ability to directly impact on these is obviously more, more constrained, but we do take each of these instances and, um, and explore learning where appropriate page 98 the next page safe from well visits, moving on to the, um, prevention activity. We carried out, um, just over 12,000, um, safe and well visits last year. So that's around 2% less than the previous year. However, that's still a significant, so over 30% increase compared to five years ago when we were completing around 9,000 safe and well visits. We've also introduced new assurance processes. So it's not just about the quantity, but also about the quality of those visits. That's a real focus for the teams. Um, and that, um, that those new assurance processes look at the evaluation of the activity and look at the impact that those have had in the behavioral changes that those visits can influence. Um, so that's, that's very positive in terms of the early signs coming from that assurance work in terms of protection. So page 99, um, we delivered 1,150 protection audits, which was 21% more than in the previous year. This increase is largely driven by increase in fully competent fire safety inspectors. So the team number who are fully competent has gone from five to nine. So that, um, that has clearly seen and the numbers increase as well. Internally on page one Oh one, we have seen notable reduction in sickness, which is clearly very positive. So we're down 13.4 average days or shifts lost in the year compared to just over 14 the previous year. And this is largely driven by a reduction in longterm absence. Again, a positive, a positive trend to see the longterm cases, uh, reduce again internally on page, um, 106 of your packs, uh, personal development reviews. So we launched a new PDR app and this was refined throughout the year, just gone with additional training and to staff, particularly engaging with on-call staff and communications and engagement and being planned out across stations. And we're, we're obviously delighted to see that a significant increase of 70%, 76, sorry, percent of staff have completed a PDR and recorded it. I think we've, we previously reported and you'll see in the narrative that we recognize the conversations are being held across stations and in our support teams, but they're not always recorded on the app for us to centrally record it. So we're seeing that, um, that passed through onto the data now. Page 107 on diversity. Um, there's a table there which summarizes the last three years of our diversity, um, statistics and the very bottom blue pie chart show the census information. Um, for each of those protected characteristics, we have made some positive progress over the last three years. I'll be at a different rates depending on the, the characteristic, but we also recognize that clearly we have further improvements to make across all, all fronts here. We are working hard as, um, but a range of different activities, which the authority will remember from previous meeting where the annual equality statement came. So there was a whole range of, um, interventions, programs and focus on diversity included in that report. And so certainly that continues on our focus on our efforts to continue to improve organizational culture through the way we work together and is also continuing. And then I think the last thing to highlight to, um, in terms of the performance section is page 110. So SSR eyes, which is a review of, um, premises that are of a significant risk or they have a specific risk to them, um, are now at 100%. So it's a very good news and, but also testament to the efforts and dedication of our crews and the services premises risk information team that we now have every single SSRI in date. Um, and today we are still in date, so it remains in date, um, post the 31st of March, which this report runs. So, um, clearly now what needs to happen to map out the constant reviewing of those as an ongoing ongoing activity, but a really good progress, which we can see in that chart there since 19 20 looking into part three then. So the looking ahead section, um, it's just to draw your attention to page one, one five. So these are the six priority activities for the safety plan for the coming, the current year that we're in. So running to March, 2025. Um, they've thought he approved these on the 27th of February meeting, so they're hopefully not a surprise, but they're in here and for for awareness. Happy to take questions that members may have. Yes, Jim. And I like firstly to say that in my time on the authority, I've seen a significant improvement in the presentation of reports. I don't know whether other members feel as I do, but the the way these things are set out these days with the use of color and photographs and and just the way it's presented, uh, makes it eminently more readable. Um, and I, I, I find it very helpful. Um, in terms of the content of this report, I think one of the things that I'm delighted to see is that, um, our decision years ago to put more resources into preventative work, I think is beginning to pay off. We're seeing evidence significantly, you know, reduction in fires and other incidents. I think that is a consequence of a lot of work that goes on behind the scenes, which perhaps doesn't attract so much media attention. But I think to stop things happening, um, in the first place is is very much what the service is all about. And if if I'm allowed to, can I just compliment all of the staff involved in in this sort of work? Because, um, it's what I hoped we would see. And it is what we are seeing. Of course, we cannot be complacent. There are some areas which, you know, inspectors who come and visit us will tell us we we need to improve upon. But I think overall, it's a very pleasing report, and it tells me that we're going in the right direction. Thank you, David. Good point. Well made. I'll enlarge on that. Thank you. Absolutely right. Sorry. Thank you, Chair. Um, just a question. Really? Family group. What? What does that mean? Does that mean our neighboring authorities? I'm just wondering. It's brought up quite a lot of mention of family group. And then my other question is around the response times. Um, obviously, we're doing better than some similar services, but it's not because we've got quite a lot of rural areas in Hampshire. Is it based on an average across the whole of Hampshire or response times in city centers where there's free whole time, like especially in Southampton when there's free whole time fire stations? Is it quicker? Or is that the average across Hampshire? Sorry. That's either Matt or chief. Yep. So the in terms of the family group, the family group is used by the National Fire Chiefs Council. So they group all services nationally into into sort of like services. And we're in a group and with other services who, um, that the category is English and Northern Irish County services with a coastline. So it's quite broad in terms of what that means. And because not all of those services that meet that sort of high level definition will have the same risks will be structured the same way. But, um, but you'll also find on page three of the of the appendix that there's a sort of a description of some of that as well. And also in the cover report, all those services are listed under paragraph seven, which is page 78 of your pack paragraph seven. And so our comparators like Essex and Kent and others are quite similar to us in terms of size and the risks. They are in that group along with others. So it's a way you get consistent benchmarking nationally. In terms of the response times, the seven minutes 42 is the average across all services, all, um, stations and all of our kind of work that we do. So you're right. Some stations will be faster than that, and some will be slower than that, depending on where the incident is and when the where the vehicle is responding to. But it is an overall average. And just to add to Matt's answer, um, so family groups is a great example where not only do we are able to compare, we actually learn from. So next two days, actually, we've got Essex senior team down to see us. We've been to there, so we will exchange with those family groups just to understand how they're doing things, how we can learn from them. They've been in inspection more recently than us, so we'll learn from them. And so they're really good comparators, as opposed to neighbors sometimes that aren't very close to our type of arrangements. David. Thank you. It's a follow on really about preventative work on. We heard that over the last five years, the safe and well visits were up a third, but year on year down slightly on. I was just wondering if there was an ideal number that that we should be that we should be making in order to get the maximum prevention preventative work. So the I think the chief may come in from a technical point of view, but there is a number that is calculated with the prevention teams each year. So that sort of number of where we want to get to does change each year, depending on risk, depending on number of referrals, depending on working with partners, social and to get care board. And so there is a piece of technical work that is done that produces a figure that says this is how many we should try and getting any one year. But that does change year one year up and down, depending on different statistics and how we're doing. How we're doing on matching what we do with what we should be doing. I mean, sadly, the reality is that every single time there's a fire, death or injury means we've failed in some way because we haven't got to that person perhaps in time. And often we look very closely at what occurred. Did they have a smoke alarm? Did they understand the seriousness of the threats that they faced? So it's one of those probably never-ending journeys for us. But I think what we're trying to do is use our data from local authorities to try and find those most vulnerable. And we know the factors that cause vulnerability. And we're using those to try and target the bits of the population we should get to. Because, frankly, I can do lots and lots of smoke alarm fitting in what used to be called the Fit to Forget campaign. So get out, knock on the door, fit a smoke alarm, rush off and do another fire. So the output numbers aren't always that helpful. So we've got to be careful we don't measure and drive our teams the wrong way. What we're trying to do is to find those most at risk, which by definition are harder to get to. They take time to get in the door. They take time to persuade that we're here to help them. And they take time for us to allow them to put smoke alarms up and all those sorts of things. So it often is about time. We have dedicated crews now, CSOs, that are actually going out and doing that so we can spend more time engaging with those parts of communities. Because our fire crews are often -- they may well do the fitting or do the visit. But obviously they can't always put the time in nurturing the relationship, which others can do now. So it is very much about a sort of team effort across local authorities and others so we can jointly understand those most vulnerable. So it is hard setting a target. We have set a target because we got criticized in the past for not having one. But those targets are iterative and we're learning every year. So I'd be reluctant to drive too hard at a number, although don't tell teams that because we do drive hard at a number. But I want to make sure that the numbers is qualitative, as well as quantitative. It's got a meaning to actually improve the safety of people's lives. Matt, do you want to come back? Yeah, no, that makes total sense, thank you very much. Chairman, I did have another one which was to do with response times. And I just wondered, in terms of the overall response times, are we getting the right appliance, as it were, in response to a shout? Because I know with ambulance services, you can get a first responder there very fast to a moving trauma. And if they get there quick enough, they get a tick in the box. However, you can turn up with a complete casualty team a few minutes later than the target response time and get a cross in the box. I was going to say black marks, we don't have those anymore. But a cross in the box, even though actually the outcomes are dramatically different. So I was -- what gave you a sense of are we getting the right thing in the right time to the right place? It's a really good question. And hopefully many of you had a conversation with Stu Adamson before he retired about the kind of response speed issue. Because you can record response times, average response times. And they were useful indicators to say what's happening in our environment, how are we doing, how are the roads doing, how quickly we're getting to the places. Taking Councillor Goodfellow's point earlier, if we had lots of false alarms in the cities, we'd have very fast response times because we've got the quickest fire engines there. But clearly, false alarms aren't good. But you can see how it's easy to tilt your response times on average very quickly by having more false alarms. You reduce the false alarms in cities, which we should be doing, you'll make your response time slower because more of your average response is in rural spaces. So in itself, it's not a very helpful measure to say about how successful we are. In fact, it could be quite the countermeasure for us. But we should keep an eye on it. It should be one of those things we monitor. But we'd like a conversation with the authority and indeed our community about is what are the measures, a number of measures we can use to show how successful we are all being together. So communities doing something themselves, us augmenting what they're doing. So we can actually measure all that together because actually it needs households to have smoke alarms, households to know what to do when a smoke alarm sounds. It needs a fire service to be able to respond quickly enough to get there. But very sadly, when we see fire deaths, more often than not, those individuals have succumbed to the fire well before we were even called. And so, you know, the response speed in that context is not having much value added apart from stopping the fire spread. So it's really about having that conversation with our communities in a way that's meaningful and not trying to avoid the issue about getting as fast as we can. But certainly we'd take no measures that would drastically reduce or make worse our response times. I should hear that there's an iterative process where you're looking at the outcomes because that's crucial. Thank you. Derek, please. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Matt. Super report. I'd just like to move it towards the end of the report. After all, our main objective at the moment is to satisfy Her Majesty's Inspectorate, and we do highlight in this report we're still deficient on 23 of 24 requires improvements. Would you like to give us an update on where we stand with these particular atoms? We've had the Inspectorate down here, I understand. You mentioned a couple of weeks ago. Shanth has returned from a period of indoctrination, Pyongyang style, so she should be able to update us. Can we just see how we're really going at the moment, because this is what we're all about, is restoring us to being good or outstanding. Of the 24 areas that HMI picked up have been addressed as part of that safety plan. Finished? Yes, that's right. That's very good. For Christmas we were only halfway through. Of the other ones, on page 111 of your pack is the summary I think you're referring to. That six-month report obviously comes through to standards and governance committee. In addition to some of that, we're working to look at national work and data returns in terms of how we better improve some of our reporting into HMI, and significant focus on performance and productivity, which will feed into some of this, in terms of going through all of the other areas. I don't have them in front of me, so other than what's in the report, unless colleagues have that to hand, we can bring that clearly through to standards and governance to make sure you've got that oversight of the actions that are still being worked through. But as it says there, on the 31st of March, 59% of those areas were, most areas were at 59% complete with 300 on the 31st of March. I think there must have been another report to standards and governance since then, which will be more detailed, and then there'll be a subsequent one in the next standards and governance year, six-monthly. So other than that, I don't have any further information. Just to add a little bit more. No, that's fine. So obviously to remind all members that standards and governance committee is obviously worked through and monitor the detail of the improvement action in response to our inspections, so we'll be taking the next update to the committee in September. And I suppose the other thing that isn't captured within the performance report, but perhaps is something for us to tell you more about, either in this forum informally or in the standards of government, is actually how our engagement with the inspector in terms of them understanding us has vastly improved, and we're far more involved. So the chief mentioned right at the start—or sorry, the chairman mentioned right at the start about the board's visit to us last month, which was very much about getting a lens into a large fire and rescue service in terms of some of the challenges it faces, senior leaders within it face, and also to reflect on the benefits and challenges through combining fire and rescue services, obviously, through our experience. So those sorts of things, the visits of the service liaison lead, Dr. Julian Commons, you know, and there's heaps of other things that perhaps would be more, you know, also useful to enhance the performance reporting, but to tell you about that rounder picture of engagement we're having with the inspector, I hope that didn't sound too indoctrinated. So we are—basically what we're saying, performance-wise, we're in good shape now for the next inspector's report, which is our real concept. Okay, very good, thank you. I think if—just let me describe this. I think looking at the data just past through, Shanta was giving you some more context, I think there are eight now complete, so it's a change of number from the one in the report, with the rest all in progress to be completed. I think the one that I think you're referring to, it must be from sounds and governance, was around productivity. So there's work being done with the Home Office to look at how we define what productivity is, because at the minute that we need to define what that is so that we can then record against it. So that is the one that is currently kind of paused whilst that work's being done with Home Office and nationally, but all the others work is in hand to deliver them. Okay. Roger, please. Thank you. I've got two points. One is on the medical corresponding, which has gone down quite considerably, 23, 24. That is only going to be from where we've supported the ambulance service. And if you look back to 1920, when we were doing a lot of work for the ambulance service, is there any indication whether any of that work is likely to come back to us so that it gives us that number at the top there, much higher? Or is that work sort of more or less dying off because the ambulance service has been able to improve itself and therefore doesn't need our support? Because if that is dying off, as I said earlier, I think we've got so much of an expert in that area, and that is a loss to the community. And somehow or other, we've got to make sure we can give that back to the community. That's my first question, and I want to go on to another issue altogether. Rob, please. I'll try and answer that question. The answer is in three parts, so it's not an easy one to answer. The first one is around our availability. So they are our retained firefighters out in more of the rural areas, and they take the car with them. So we just need to remember when they're not being used during their normal life with their families or at work, and they take that co-responder car with them. So there is a challenge with that around their personal life as well as does the employer have their car outside with them. So there is a challenge that we're trying to address to try to get more people. The ideal number is 10 per vehicle to be able to do that piece of work. So that's piece one. The second one is around the National Health Service guidelines for call types. So we were talking earlier around the numbers of if the ambulance service get there with a co-responder, a volunteer, or whoever it ticks the box. Co-responders are very much in that conversation. So the types of calls that co-responders should attend have changed dramatically. So it used to be 100 call types. It's now down to about 50 call types. So you've taken 50 percent of the calls. So if someone is having a domino pain, they would have used to have gone to that type of call. Now they won't go to that. And that's because they need a certain specific care package that goes with them, which our responders aren't trained to deal with. So the call numbers have dropped by 50 percent. And on top of that, you've got the challenges within South Central Ambulance Service themselves with the numbers of call types and how they're trying to respond to that. So actually some of the calls they're trying to keep us back for to make sure that we're able to attend those cardiac arrest calls and the others. So the ambulance service part is prioritizing as well. So there's actually a three-part answer to that. The part that we can definitely play is making sure that we're available with the skills and the equipment and the vehicles as much as they possibly can. On the force alarms, on page 94 or page 11, it talks about that the 23, 24, 64 percent of force alarms were in domestic properties. And then it goes on that there was the -- which has seen between 2018 and 2023, a 63 percent increase in the highest increase has been in purpose-built flats. That indicates to me that those will either be local authority, housing associations, or privately rented blocks of flats. If that is the case, those fire alarms should be maintained. So if we're getting a lot of force alarms from them, can we not charge them because they're not maintaining them properly? So technically, yes. Often the challenge here is what's called a force alarm. So it may not be a building fault or a defect. It could be just behaviors. And one of the challenges that we have in as much as other organizations, other fire rescue services have decided not to go, not to respond to some alarm, fire alarm apparatus. And as some will tell you, you never go to a force alarm. You only come home from a force alarm. But nonetheless, it's important that we put the responsibility with where it should be. So in a commercial premises, maybe a supermarket or one of those places, you'd expect them to manage their fire alarm, maintain it, and deal with it. They don't really need us unless they've got a fire. Some of these other buildings, though, could well be indicating to us that there's someone in the building having very poor behaviors, in which case they could be cooking around places. They could be having -- doing all sorts of things which would cause danger to other occupants. So I'm really conscious of taking the right steps for those people to understand in that building, in that flat, what's happening, what's going wrong, and how do we help people change. Because by charging or by doing something else may be the right incentive, but it may be that we have to educate someone else in the building. But often these are complicated buildings. In other words, identifying who owns, who manages, who's managing the arrangements in the building can be quite complex. And certainly our teams -- the fact of having false alarms there is if we indicated something's going wrong. And so enforcement teams would be working with those buildings to understand what's going wrong, working with the owners if they're identifiable, or working with occupants to make sure that things are changed. So it's an excellent way of us finding out something's going amiss. It's really an early indicator, and we don't want that to escalate to a real fire or something else going more badly wrong. So at the moment we're using it for an indicator. At some time in the future there will be pressure on us to reduce these numbers. I'm conscious not to just cut them off and not attend. We'll use critical intelligence about people's safety in our community. So it doesn't really answer your question about how we do it, but charging is one of the options amongst lots of other things. We can use the law. We can use other options as well. Can I say what I was looking at is that where the alarm system is malfunctioning, where that is continually malfunctioning, and that's the reason for the false alarm, then I think that if it's in a private building, it should be charged. That's the ones which I'm looking at. I mean, I accept what you're saying, fully agree with what you're saying, is that we're getting intelligence when we're going to places, and it may be that you've got a block of flats where there are people in there who kiss for the joy of it, like setting off a fire alarm. I'm not so concerned about those because you will be picking up the problems and those. But it's when the equipment is malfunctioning, and it's proved to be malfunctioning, not through the intervention of somebody in the block doing something. Yeah, and that's exactly the point. We can take enforcement action in that point, or we could charge. But the fact is that of that 63 percent increase, I don't know the numbers, but the numbers won't malfunction. There will be other things as well. Sally, please. Yeah, going back to His Majesty's Inspector, where I've only been on the authority a year, I'm still getting my head around, so apologies for all the questions. Is it very similar to like an Ofsted visit? So if it requires improvement, you get a visit sooner than you would if it was good. Is that kind of—because I wasn't around when the visit happened. Shantha, please. Perhaps if I take that one. So absolutely, no, it's an important question to ask. So I suppose in simple terms it is useful to describe it as Ofsted in some respects because it's a body that shines a light on a public service for the benefit of the public. In terms of the question around frequency, that's—it's very much sort of built into a cycle of inspection. So they have—they only inspect English fire and rescue services, so what, sort of 45 or so, and so that's over about—the current round is about a two-year period. The current round three inspection is the start of the cycle, the more the services were perhaps poorer performing, were frontloaded. We're right at the end, so you can read into that. However, once you have your normal inspection, if there was something through the course of that inspection, which takes place over a number of weeks, that the team found were wanting and more than wanting endangered public, they could put in track processes to accelerate the publication to the public and also a plan that the respective chief officer would have to create to assure both the public and the inspector of how they were going to address that particular risk. I hope that answers okay, yeah. Members, thank you Chancellor. Members, any more? Deb, Zoe. Sorry, not a question, more of just comments, which is why I sort of was pausing. Really pleased to see the PDR jump so high. I think if it is a matter of just recording, that's great, but I think it does give us reassurance as an authority that they are happening, but more importantly, work later on to look at retaining and succession planning. So that's a fantastic jump and I hope it continues to go up in that direction and more importantly, maybe look at how we add that value to the on-call, which I know is maybe the area that isn't maybe as robust for the PDR process due to accessibility. Again, really pleased to see the diversity figures going in the right direction. I do think that again is more about how we're capturing data, so whether or not that's through the PDR process, the engaging with our employees and how comfortable they feel. So the work maybe we've done in the culture and I think that will take us forward with the inspector. So you need to know the data to understand how we can support those individuals. So I think that's a really good step forward. Still quite a bit of work to do, but they're heading in the right direction, which is great. And lastly, because I don't think it has been mentioned, really great to see your notable areas of practice in there. I think it's great that we include that in the report because I think the public should see those areas that necessarily we don't necessarily have to report on. So you've got contaminants in here, which is great under our people, and really good to see the children and young people. And I just want to bring out one set of figures, which is the children and young people's activity. The team has worked with just short of 35,000 pupils across 618 schools, and that's great to have that engagement level. So thank you. Matt, thank you. Excellent report. Just going back to something that David Harrison said, can you imagine if that report was just all text? And you'd be dead before you finished it. We remember when some of them were a bit like that. I mean, that's a beautiful report, Matt. It's so easy to read. It's so easy to understand. And all reports should be like that. So thank you very much. Thank you. And thank you for your comments on the report. I'll pass that back to the teams. I know our comms team and our performance team work really hard on the readability of it, so thank you for that. And on that report, I mean, this is now in the public domain, so try and do something with it. You know, I'm very keen that anything we do, the Forest Service does, everybody gets to know about something you said, Sally. I mean, I should be sending this to my parish councils, whether they read it or not. It's up to them. And to the borough councils, because people should know it. It's going to go to the Lord Lieutenant. It's going to go to the Lord Lieutenant of the Isle of Wight. We should spread it around. So if you have recipients for it, then do please send it out. That would be good. Okay, moving on then to, yeah. Next item. I think you should be and so should the Chief be aware of this. There's an email just come in from the County Council to say it's with much sadness that I write to inform you of the death of Michael Cartwright. And Michael Cartwright was a previous chairman of this authority. Okay, no two. Thank you. Thank you. We'll put into place what we should do. Let's just come in. Thank you. Thank you. We will respond. Okay, people. Item 12, and health and safety policy and statement of intent. And I would ask Shantha if you would present the paper. Good afternoon, members. So I would like to present to you an overview of the health and safety policy and statement of intent for 2024-25. So the policy is the first of the fire authority owned policies. And I know that Stu Adamson has been working with you with respect to another set of policies. And the reason that I mentioned that is because the look and feel of this policy is in line with those. That health and safety policy builds on the existing service policy. The statement of intent is something that you will have seen previously. It's an annual item. And paragraph four explains why it's been tabled for today's fire authority meeting. It's subject to your approvals. It would be approved retrospectively because it's a statutory requirement for a statement of intent to be published prominently in all relevant workplaces. Paragraph nine to ten sets out the health and safety executive's guidance of what a health and safety policy should cover, with paragraph ten being specifically on the fire authority's policy, your policy, and then the statement of intent and the service policy, which sets out the more precise details. Paragraph 11 to 12 talks about what the statement of intent is, which is a pledge by the chief officer and the chairman of the fire authority, as I said, which would be displayed consistently in prominent workplaces. And then paragraphs 13 to 16 go into a little bit more of detail about your health and safety policy, including how it's delegated to the chief fire officer and specifically in paragraph 15 how the performance is monitored consistently through the executive group. Within paragraph 16, I'd just like to draw your attention to a minor amendment to the constitution, which has been requested within the report, which is simply to remove the term well-being, so health, safety, and well-being, statement of intent to health, safety, statement of intent. And we have a separate well-being strategy that's being led by Molly Rowland, which covers more broadly well-being, and that then enables the policy and the statement of intent to remain consistent within the specific requirements of health and safety legislation. And then I would also finally like to draw your attention to the consultation section, which commences at paragraph 19, which really sets out how we work with all trade union safety representatives and this health and safety committee, which I chair, how I ensure that that happens both informally and both informally as well, and certainly returning to service. And day one, I was chairing the health and safety committee. It was extremely pleasing to see full representation by the representative bodies and also their active engagement within the meeting. So that was good news. And then very finally, before I draw this overview to a close, I just want to draw your attention to the appendix A, which is the proposed fire authority's health and safety policy with the new livery, the red, white, and blue, which will denote all of the future fire authority policies that come here for approval and ownership, and the second appendix, which has the health and safety statement of intent. I mentioned that due to the statutory requirements, this current statement of intent has been signed and is currently displayed in all workplaces. Should there be any amendments to that from your discussions today, then, of course, those changes will be made and updated comments -- sorry, updated versions of the statement of intent published to replace all of those. And happy to take any questions. Thank you, Shantha. Members, David. Chairman, is this central government telling us what you should pledge and what the chief officer should pledge, or have you had an agreement beforehand, an opportunity to decide that you will sign this? You know, instinctively, I always react against centralized control as if it was a communist state where we're told what we're going to do. It may not be quite like that, but I'd like some reassurance that there have been discussions and agreement that go on before we get to this stage. As the arch defender of democracy, I'll give you the chief. Just to assure you about how this works, because if it were dictated from the top, then I couldn't be held accountable, and nor could the chairman or the authorities. So obviously, the Health and Safety at Work Act and the legislation is agreed by legislative arrangements of parliament, but it is up to us to decide what we'll commit to. Clearly, the law and the Health and Safety at Work will decide whether we are doing our duty in terms of that act, and that's really what this is about. So many of the things you'll see I read across to make sure we'll do what legislation says we must. But equally, there's some stuff in here which we believe in fundamentally to make sure we keep our team safe. So to reassure you, this is not a diktat from the top. It is different in other services, other organizations. This is our version of what we believe is right, and certainly if anyone in the authority would like it amended, there is an amendment opportunity in here. The Brown Book is part of the law. It basically is a code of practice for how you bring the trade union and law together. So that's how you work through risk assessments together. Any workplace can have representatives required to work along the lines of the Brown Book, so that's how that works. Members, any more? Okay, Chancellor, thank you. If I can alert you to page 118. Page 108, where the recommendation is that the proposed health and safety policy be approved by this full authority, that the health and safety statement of intent, 2425, be approved by this full authority, and that the amendment of the constitution as described at paragraph 16 be approved by this full authority. Approved? Thank you. Did we not do that? Going back to the last report, a bit of a bungle, I'm told. This is Matt reports. Page 77, we need to approve. We only need to note Matt's report. Noted. Well spotted, Chief. Come and see me afterwards. Okay, next item item 13, the Minister of Standard and Governance Committee, which I would invite the chairman if you have any comment. Thank you, Chair. As you know, this was a deferred committee meeting going to the problems we had with the core rate in March. There's little to add to the minutes there that's self-explanatory. We'll have to resolve one or two minor issues, but I'd just like to highlight that standards and governance is in fact quite heavy on scrutiny, which is not normal with an audit led organization. And the work that internal audit does and the amount of limited assurance investigations, the risk register and everything else is quite substantial. And I think some of that, the internal audit should take credit for the way they keep on top of these matters. And that's probably not referred to specifically in the minutes. Other than that, there's very little to add there. I did -- I was written by the chief in respect of .129 on page 131 as to how we -- what we wanted to say is what was resolved in the closing minutes of the meeting on April the 9th. And things are moving a little bit forward in terms of this situation. In terms of the county council, which much more technical, we've had a lot of problems forming -- being able to align training and it's not really a problem with the fire. Align training because we don't know who's going to be sitting on these committees and therefore who we give the specialist training to. But they've eased off on the requirements of the training and we've now had an outline from people in the organization as to what is expected of the revised committee. And that will be moving forward very late in the year now, not in the autumn. Same as I expect in terms of .129 sit for -- we are in a position where we can agree to sit for guidelines and we'll be stating that we're agreeing to sit for guidelines, which is what the requirement is. And I look forward to talking about the training aspect and the composition of the committee in due course. >> Thank you, Derek. Any questions, anybody? Okay, so I declare that these minutes have been received. All happy? And we will move to item 14, which is an exclusion of press and public. Hang on, I've got to read it out first. To resolve that the public be excluded from the meeting during the following items of business as it is likely in view of the nature of the business to be transacted or the nature of the proceedings, that if members of the public were present during these items, there would be disclosure to them of exempt information within paragraph three of part one of the schedule 12A to the local government act 1972. And further, that in all of the circumstances of the cases, the public interest in maintaining the exemption outweighs the public interest in disclosing the information for the reasons set out in this report. So we're happy to declare the next law exempt. So we're closing the meeting now to the public as the following reports are of a confidential nature and there is a requirement not to disclose information in the following reports. Thank you. [Applause] Thank you. [Applause] Thank you. [Applause] Thank you. [Applause] Thank you. [Applause] Thank you. [Applause] Thank you. [Applause] Thank you. [Applause] Thank you. [Applause] Thank you. [Applause] Thank you. [Applause] Thank you. [Applause] Thank you. [Applause] Thank you. [Applause] Thank you. [Applause] [Applause] Thank you. [Applause] Thank you. [Applause] Thank you. [Applause] Thank you. [Applause] [Applause] [BLANK_AUDIO]