Staffordshire Fire and Rescue Service is outstanding at responding to major incidents, but further improvements are needed
Staffordshire Fire and Rescue Service has improved its performance since its previous inspection, but it needs to provide a consistently good service in some areas, the fire inspectorate has said.
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Effectiveness, efficiency and people 2023–2025: Staffordshire Fire and Rescue Service
His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services (HMICFRS) has graded Staffordshire Fire and Rescue Service’s performance across 11 areas. It found the service was ‘outstanding’ in one area, ‘good’ in six areas and ‘adequate’ in four areas.
HMICFRS said the service is outstanding at responding to major and multi-agency incidents and works actively with partner organisations to take pre-emptive action to prevent incidents from occurring. Inspectors said the service has been investing time and energy in shared services to better support its people.
But the inspectorate also said that the service needs to make improvements in some areas. For example, it should make sure all staff understand the benefits of equality, diversity and inclusion and their role in promoting them. The service should also make sure it has an effective quality assurance process, so staff carry out fire safety audits to a consistent standard.
His Majesty’s Inspector of Fire and Rescue Services Michelle Skeer said:
“It was a pleasure to revisit Staffordshire Fire and Rescue Service, and I am grateful for the positive and constructive way in which they worked with our inspection staff.
“The service is outstanding at responding to major and multi-agency incidents and has improved its culture at all levels of the organisation. We found that staff were comfortable challenging and reporting unacceptable behaviour.
“However, it also needs to improve in some areas to provide a consistently good service. For example, all staff should improve their knowledge and understanding of equality, diversity and inclusion. While they have also restructured their prevention and protection departments to target people and premises most at risk of fire and other emergencies, the benefits of this have yet to be fully realised.
“We look forward to seeing the further progress made, which we will be monitoring closely.”
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Effectiveness, efficiency and people 2023–2025: Staffordshire Fire and Rescue Service
Notes
- For further information, please contact the HMICFRS Press Office on 0300 071 6781 or HMICPressOffice@hmicfrs.gov.uk.
- This inspection contains our third assessment of the service’s effectiveness and efficiency, and how well it looks after its people. We have measured the service against 11 areas and given a grade for each.
- We haven’t given separate grades for effectiveness, efficiency and people as we did previously. This is to encourage the service to consider our inspection findings as a whole and not focus on just one area.
- We have expanded our previous four-tier system of judgements to five. These changes mean that it isn’t possible to make direct comparisons between grades awarded in this round of inspections with those from previous years.
- A reduction in grade, particularly from good to adequate, doesn’t necessarily mean that there has been a reduction in performance, unless we say so in the report.
- Read more information about the 2023-25 assessment framework for fire and rescue service inspections.