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 - Midlothian, East Lothian and Scottish Borders (MELSB) LSO Area Focus
Midlothian, East Lothian and Scottish Borders (MELSB) LSO Area Focus
- 199 AccidentalDwelling Fires
- 143 Road Traffic Accidents
- 566 Secondary Fires
- 2,619 False Alarms
- 21 Stations
- 305 Personnel (FTE)
- 320,280 Population
- 5,765km2Area
MELSB LSO Debrief
| Theme | Highs | Lows |
| Prevention and Protection | Prevention staff feel empowered to develop solutions and work with partners to improve community outcomes. | Getting access to schools is said to be a big problem, because school curriculum core priorities do not always align to the SFRS's or its timings. |
| Community engagement is occurring beyond fire safety into other wider areas of community protection, such as hoarding and domestic abuse. | Community engagement packages are reported to be not readily available. There is real frustration over not being able to find resources. | |
| A Community Safety plan for 2023-24 focusing on five themes is currently being developed. | There was felt to be poor Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) and no inclement weather clothing for the Community Action Team. | |
| There was evidence of engaging with partners and exchange of referrals regarding those members of the community considered vulnerable. | There is no centrally provided induction material for new staff, with a feeling of detachment from the Directorate. | |
| There is evidence of post domestic incident engagement being carried out, although the numbers have reduced over the past three years. | There was reported to be a lack of availability of drill-ground supervision courses to allow prevention staff to fully contribute to the provision of the Fire Skills youth engagement courses. | |
| No career development pathway or qualifications offered to Community Safety Engagement staff. Access to Continued Professional Development (CPD) is predominantly offered by external partners, with very little offered by the Directorate. | ||
| Currently recruiting additional staff to the Protection team. | Recruitment and retention of Protection staff is an ongoing challenge. The progression pathway is not clear at this time. There is a lack of experience of enforcement within some of the current management structure. | |
| Protection staff feel very well supported by CPD events. | Staff felt that fire safety audit targets need to be reduced, staff struggle to get beyond Framework designated premises. There is also seldom time to engage and educate dutyholders. There is said to be a general lack of awareness of their responsibilities by dutyholders. | |
| At a personal level there is said to be a good relationship between the fire investigation team and Protection personnel to exchange information. | Continuing problems with the enforcement system Prevention and Protection Enforcement Database (PPED), means that personnel are maintaining their own records to cover system inadequacies. | |
| The Protection team feel well supported by management. | There is now an expectation for Protection staff to remain competent operationally, however, staff report that audit targets have not been reviewed to accommodate this extra workload. | |
| Response | On-Call stations generally have the usual issues around daytime availability although there are some limited examples of very good availability for which the crews are to be commended. | Lack of crewing was said to be very challenging, particularly for water rescue stations meeting minimum crewing levels. There is also an impact on training of specialist stations when crew are detached or the pump is sent on stand-by to make up for numbers elsewhere. |
| The online briefing session for Wholetime personnel returning from annual leave was described as being valuable. | The lack of drivers is generally said to be challenging, resulting in examples of crew members continually having to drive appliances, in some cases for years. | |
| The Bank Hours pilot scheme to fill On-Call staffing deficiencies by circulating available staff to work in other areas to keep pumps on the run, was hailed as being a great success. | There is a high degree of frustration around On-Call recruitment with a desire for more local involvement and control. The process was said to be too slow in getting people through the system. | |
| Good support to On-Call staff from On-Call Support Watch Commanders was reported. The role was seen as a positive development for On-Call. | Initial training commitment is an issue for On-Call staff getting leave from primary employers. Medical and fitness requirements for On-Call are said to be a challenge. | |
| Operational Intelligence information held was being checked to ensure its accuracy. There was some limited evidence of crews visiting risk sites. | There is a lack of faith in the Getac operational intelligence tablet capabilities resulting in its infrequent use. Some tablet syncing issues were reported meaning that the information may not be up to date. | |
| There was some limited evidence of changes to response arrangements, due to short-term increase in risk, however for some other identified long-term risks, there is no local capability. | Staff overwhelmingly identified the need for wildfire Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) to be issued | |
| The SharePoint system for station management information was thought to be very good. | Reinforced Autoclaved Aerated Concrete panel roofing issues are present at several stations in the area, requiring considerable capital spend. | |
| Some stations had inadequate Breathing Apparatus servicing facilities, with poor access to spare cylinders. There is a shortage across the area which has an impact on training. | ||
| Partnership | Partners have a very positive view of the Service. With relationships with the local authorities described as being strong. | A lack of access to data was reported as staff are now not located with some partners at tactical meetings, which was a result of working practice changes brought about during the pandemic. These meetings were described as really useful information exchanges. There was felt to be scope for partners to increase referrals for home safety visits. |
| There were examples of premises sharing, with partners keen to explore more opportunities. Though in some areas location sharing had stopped as a result of the pandemic. | Disappointment was expressed by a partner that the shared premises initiative to replace Dalkeith Fire Station seemed to have stalled. | |
| The style and content of scrutiny committee performance papers was valued and liked. | The Community Asset Register continues to be underused and not well understood. | |
| People | Personnel generally felt supported by the LSO management team. But the turnover in managers was also cited as a problem. | Training is particularly under resourced, with a need for more support in the borders area. There was not a positive view of Newbridge training centre provided training, there was said to be a fear of going there. Access to some courses is problematic. There was said to be a lack of feedback on course places allocation information from the Directorate. There was a feeling that there is scope to run more courses locally, realising efficiencies. |
| There was an overall positive view of local trainers and training delivery, though there were also limited examples of less satisfaction with the support given. | Getting Risk Assessments approved for off-station training sites was reported as problematic, taking up a lot of time. A lack of access to venues to train is also a more general issue. | |
| Wholetime and On-call stations were aligned for training purposes. But joint training had been interrupted during the pandemic. | The low number of computers and poor connectivity were seen by many as barriers to effective training, particularly for On-Call staff and in the remoter areas. | |
| There was said to be a lack of structure to urban search and rescue (USAR) training. Issues were fed back to the central directorate with no response. | ||
| Support to newly promoted staff, arranging ICT systems permissions was felt could be improved to improve efficiency. |