Fire chief “looking forward” to inspector’s next visit

The chief fire officer at Shropshire Fire and Rescue Service (SFRS) says he is looking forward to an inspector seeing how much progress has been made after a “cause of concern” was issued.

In total, five key elements were highlighted by the inspectorate last November, including governance and risk management, corporate risk management, service planning, performance and leadership development, digital and data strategy, and financial governance and statutory oversight.

A report sent to Shropshire and Wrekin Fire and Rescue Authority ahead of its meeting at Telford Central Fire Station on Wednesday (June 25)  shows that 29 of the 64 objectives have been completed, with all of them set to be concluded by November 30, 2028.

There were also 30 areas of improvement (AFIs) highlighted in the inspector’s report, stating the requirement for enhanced resource management, strengthened financial oversight, and more effective governance processes.

The report also emphasised the importance of improving workplace culture, promoting diversity and inclusion, and ensuring more robust performance management systems.

In response, SFRS says it has developed a comprehensive action plan to address each one, and implemement a new strategy.

This includes making sure the service effectively addressed the burden of a false alarm, staff have access to services to support both their mental and physical health, improving all-staff understanding and application of the performance development review process, and improving the way it collects equality data so it can better understand its workforce’s demographics and needs.

The inspectorate is due to see what progress has been made on July 21.

“I am genuinely really looking forward to the inspectorate to come back because the cause of concern areas they’re looking at, we’ve got plans in place,” said CFO Simon Hardiman.

“We’ve made a lot of progress in a lot of areas in not a lot of time.

“It’s up to us to show that we’re on the right trajector. What I would like to happen is that the inspectorate notes the improvement methodology we’ve used because it’s quite progressive in terms of how we’ve mapped our journey and plan using technology.

“Our last experience with the inspectorate was very much around ‘we think we’ve done it’ and we find out on the day of the races we’re not quite there.

“Whereas this time, I think we can really evidence the journey we have been on.”