Inspection of the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service: East Service Delivery Area
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East Service Area Delivery Inspection of the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service (SFRS) which focuses on four key themes: Prevention and Protection; Response; Partnership and People.
Appendix B: LSO Area Performance - City of Edinburgh (COE) LSO Area Focus
City of Edinburgh (COE) LSO Area Focus
- 398 Accidental Dwelling Fires
- 94 Road Traffic Accidents
- 1,883 Secondary Fires
- 6,269 False Alarms
- 8 Stations
- 329 Personnel(FTE)
- 526,470 Population
- Area 264km2
CoE LSO Debrief
| Theme | Highs | Lows |
| Prevention and Protection | There are some examples of the Prevention team contributing to addressing wider community issues such as fuel poverty and corporate parenting, which has a high focus. | Prevention and Protection (P&P) teams are both understaffed. It is challenging to get people into P&P, as P&P experience is not a requirement for promotion and there are no financial incentives to work there. |
| There was said to have been a reduction in youth related fires by 60%, showing the benefit of youth work. Intervention activity has also taken place with young offenders. | Youth initiatives are reported to be in decline due to a lack of staff within the Prevention team. | |
| Staff feel moderately empowered to work with partners to improve community outcomes and don't feel micromanaged, but morale was said to be low due to constant management changes. | Community engagement education packages are said to be not readily available, causing a sense of real frustration. | |
| Vulnerable people referrals are taking place but re-engagement work has been undertaken with partners to further revitalise partnership working post pandemic, when joint working had been reduced. | Staff report that the Community Safety Engagement Tool (CSET) is not recording activity correctly, it is not intuitive to use and felt it should be adapted to run on a portable tablet device. Post Domestic Incident Responses (PDIRs) should be carried out dynamically and so would also benefit from a tablet-based resource. | |
| Evaluation of initiatives and engagement is undertaken. | There is no career development pathway or qualifications offered to Community Safety Engagement staff. There is no formal induction process for new staff. Access to Continued Professional Development (CPD) is predominantly offered by external partners, with very little offered by the P&P Directorate. | |
| There is poor Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) and no inclement weather clothing for the Community Action Team. | ||
| The area is now recruiting auditing and enforcement officers, to fill vacancies in the Protection team. | Recruitment and retention of staff into Protection is an ongoing challenge. | |
| Enforcement staff are very well supported by CPD events. | Fire safety audits undertaken struggle to go beyond defined Framework premises. The area is really busy with post fire audits. Fire safety audits as a result of Edinburgh festival event venues takes up a lot of officers' time. | |
| One officer is working with frequent Unwanted Fire Alarm Signal (UFAS) offenders to try to reduce the instances of these. | There are reported continuing problems with the Prevention and Protection Enforcement Database (PPED) system, this leads to personnel maintaining their own records to cover its inadequacies. Staff feel that audits should be recorded as they are being undertaken using a tablet device to improve efficiency. | |
| Enforcement officers generate the letters to landlords or managing agents for high rise flats visits undertaken by operational crews, which the crews find helpful; however, this was said to be a burden for protection staff due to the high number of premises in the area. A risk-based approach for these visits has been developed, but as yet has not been implemented. | The area has Houses in Multiple Occupation (HMO) that are said to be difficult to audit, due to a perceived lack of will to take landlords to task. | |
| Response | Work is being carried out to ensure that Operational Intelligence (OI) data is current. | There is a lack of faith in the Getac tablet capabilities resulting in its infrequent use. There are reported instances of tablet syncing issues, meaning that the information might not be up to date. |
| With the new national UFAS policy rollout there will be a reduction in turnouts which will make an impact in the area, allowing more time to train. However, given the high number of sleeping risk premises in the area there was an opinion expressed locally that the benefits might not be as great as initially envisaged. | The main challenge described by Wholetime personnel is a lack of crewing, leading to frequent pump withdrawal and a lot of detached duties for crews. There is a feeling that the pump withdrawal strategy is not working well for the area. | |
| Equipment and structural fire PPE is reported to be generally good, with new torches singled out for praise. | Detached duties are said to be impacting on training in general but particularly for specialist assets. | |
| Some examples of adjusting Pre-Determined Attendances to respond to changes in risk were described. | Staff overwhelmingly called for wildfire PPE to be issued. | |
| A good example of standard tests being recorded electronically on Excel, this is seen as a positive enhancement. | Station-wear uniform was said by some to be terrible and of a very poor quality, leading to more regular replacement. | |
| Reinforced Autoclaved Aerated Concrete (RAAC) panel roofing issues are present at several stations, leading to very poor working conditions for some staff. Resolving the roofing problem will require significant capital expenditure. | ||
| Fireground radios were reported to be very poor. | ||
| The quality of spare appliances was reported as poor. Some defect turnaround times were also elongated, with 18 months quoted for an Aerial Ladder Platform (ALP) hose. | ||
| Partnership | Partners in the area have a very positive view of the Service. | Some partners noted that the constant turnover of SFRS Flexi Duty Officers is not helpful, having to start over 'teaching' the new postholder. |
| The Local Area Liaison Officer (LALO) position was said to be valued by partners. | The Community Asset Register continues to not be well utilised, some officers had no experience or knowledge of it. | |
| There are some limited examples of premises sharing with partners. | ||
| The style and content of scrutiny committee performance papers was valued and liked by Elected Members. | ||
| People | It was reported that there has been some improvement in the On-Call recruitment process, taking less time. | There was said to be a feeling of low morale, linked to staffing levels and the impact of detached duties, as well as the turnover in supervisory staff. |
| Personnel generally felt supported by the LSO management team. | Instructor shortages at Newbridge are said to be having an impact on course attendance, with evidence of Compartment Fire Behaviour Training being cancelled. | |
| The updated Training for Operational Competence (TfOC) system was thought to be better for the balanced training of firefighters. | There were reports of a lack of training in some equipment, e.g. on heavy rescue appliance. Urban Search and Rescue (USAR) training was said to be consistently poor. There are said to be no venues for trench collapse training. | |
| Staff reported that they valued operational update case studies (e.g. Glasgow School of Art fire, and the Albert Drive fire), but don't feel it is worth feeding into the Operational Assurance process as they don't get feedback on their contribution. | There is a reported shortage of assessors and verifiers affecting trainee sign off, with a mix of systems in use to record trainee development. Managers reported a of lack of clarity on the process. | |
| Talent identification, development and the promotion process were reported as being poor by staff. | ||
| On-Call staff feel the need for more contract flexibility in the hours offered to attract a wider range of people. |