Agenda item

The Board will receive verbal updates from partners present, some written updates are attached.

Wiltshire Fire & Rescue Service will be presenting proposals for their Integrated Risk Management Plan for 2012-15.

Wiltshire Fire and Rescue Service (WF&RS).

Scott Taylor, Station Manager presented the WF&RS proposals for their Integrated Risk Management Plan for 2012-15. Consultation documents and a freepost survey had also been circulated around the room.

The risks that Wiltshire Fire and Rescue Service face are changing, from a reduction in their budget, through the increased housing within Wiltshire to the type of incidents that they respond to on a daily basis.

Their goal is to meet these challenges and provide an improved service to the public in the most effective and efficient way possible. 

Areas of Change

To achieve this goal, WF&RS have reviewed how they provide the service today and how they should be providing that service to the public in the future.  They have come up with five proposals that will expand their ability to respond to incidents, enhance the knowledge and skills of staff and reduce the overall cost of the Service to the taxpayer.

WF&RS are proposing the following options:

1.    To alter the way they employ firefighters on the Retained Duty System (on-call staff) to guarantee availability and to provide a sustainable system.

2.    To alter the way they crew stations to relocate staff throughout the county to create communities of stations to manage increased risk presented by future developments.

3.    To alter the shift times of operational staff to occur outside of incident peak hours.

4.    To alter duty systems to provide enhanced cover.

5.    To relocate specialist vehicles to provide suitable and sustainable arrangements.

WF&RS welcomes public opinion on the proposed changes; this could be done in a number of ways.  People could register as a stakeholder and receive a survey to complete, or view the consultation document circulated at the meeting and comment using the supplied e-mail address consultation@wiltsfire.gov.uk, or they could view the proposals in the packs and complete the freepost survey also provided. To view the consultation on line, follow the link: http://www.wiltsfire.gov.uk/irmp/index.html

Questions and comments were then taken from the room, these included:

·         To what extent has the staff been consulted on the proposed 12hr shift change? Answer - Current shift patterns were 9hr day shifts and 15 hr night shifts. The proposal for a 12 hr shift for days as well as nights has been investigated for any health & Safety issues due to tiredness.

·         Can you confirm that the 1^st responder service for Mere would not be affected by any of the planned changes? Answer - Scott Taylor confirmed that the current level of service would be maintained.

·         Has any consultation with local employers been undertaken to tackle the issues around employers not permitting staff to be released from duties to act as Retained Fire Fighters? Answer – WF&RS had consulted with current employers and also aimed to make the Retained Fire Fighter role more appealing to those who may not have considered it previously, such as mothers at home.

·         Can you explain how one new unit will be better than the four it would replace? Answer – There would be a fleet reduction because one new unit would be capable of carrying all of the specialised kits previously carried on the four individual vehicles.

Wiltshire Police Authority (WPA)

Angus MacPherson, Independent member of the WPA gave an update to the Board including:

·         The WPA recently held a Community Awards ceremony, where community officers were nominated by the public, where PC Peter Jung from Wilton received three nominations and PCSO Jake Noble from Mere received 2 nominations. The winner was a PCSO from Swindon.

·         Tisbury Police were completely committed to becoming part of the Tisbury Community Campus project.

·         The Police recently gave away £30,000 of proceeds from the sale of  property through an awards system. A further £40,000 of funds would shortly be available for up to £3,000 awards, which groups could apply for towards youth depravation projects.

·         Elections for a Police and Crime Commissioner would be taking place in November 2012, this would replace the Police Authority. The final date for nominations for the post was 13^th October 2012.

Community Area Police

Inspector Lindsey Winters ran through the Mere and Tisbury Community Area Updates which were attached to the agenda, the Wilton Update was circulated at the meeting and is attached to the end of these minutes.

Youth

Mark Holden (Project Co-ordinator - Leisure Credits Young Enterprise Initiative) ran through the youth services update on behalf of Jaki Farrell, who was away with a group of young people on a residential. The update was circulated at the meeting and is attached to the end of these minutes.

Comments and questions were then taken from the floor, they included:

·         Councillor Deane praised Jaki Farrell for her work with the young people. He added that when he had met with young people from Tisbury in the past he had always been surprised by their lack of experience outside of Tisbury and Wiltshire, suggesting that in the future he would like to see Tisbury Twinned with somewhere in Europe.

·         What is the future for the Leisure Credit Scheme financially? Answer – Mark explained that in his experience, Wiltshire had invested in its youth services, far more than he had seen in other counties. Mark was on a fixed term contract, funded by the Sewing Seeds charity until September 2013. He hoped that enough interest would be created by then to enable the scheme to continue beyond that date. He felt that Wiltshire could create a model which could then be used by other areas across the county.