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| The Fourth London Safety Plan includes new performance targets |
The plan will now be subject to a twelve week consultation to collect the views of Londoners and key stakeholders.
Members of the London Fire and Emergency Planning Authority have recently approved a range of proposals made by London Fire Commissioner, Ron Dobson, paving the way for public consultation on the future of the capital's fire and rescue service.
The London Fire and Emergency Planning Authority, which runs London Fire Brigade, agreed that the ideas contained in the draft 'Fourth London Safety Plan' would lead to significant improvements in services, whilst ensuring London's taxpayers continue to get value for money.
The Plan also includes new performance targets for consultation, which will see the Brigade aim to reduce fires which damage property, reduce arson and reduce call-outs to non emergency incidents.
The Plan will now be subject to a twelve week consultation to collect the views of Londoners and key stakeholders.
Councillor Brian Coleman, AM FRSA, Chairman of the London Fire and Emergency Planning Authority said: "London has an excellent fire and rescue service, but we recognise the need to move forward with the modernisation of the Brigade and ensure we are making the very most of the specialist skills and equipment at our disposal. The Commissioner's proposals deliver a range of improvements and efficiency across the board, shaking up the way we prepare for and respond to emergencies without cutting front line services."
The Fourth London Safety Plan would lead to significant improvements in services, whilst ensuring London's taxpayers continue to get value for money |
Proposals in the draft Fourth London Safety Plan include:
- The establishment of four Bulk Extinguishing Materials Centres at Harrow (subject to further detailed consideration), Kingston, Beckenham and Barking fire stations. Each would involve the co-location of pump ladders, bulk foam units and hose layer lorries and in the longer term we would also be looking to consider the addition of high volume pumps and bulk water carriers. These centres would also enable the introduction of alternate crewing across the Centres. The creation of these centres would give better placement of assets for strategic cover and create better skills groups.
- The establishment of four Rescue Centres at Edmonton, Heston (subject to further detailed consideration), Croydon and East Ham fire stations. Each would involve the co-location of a range of rescue equipment including pump ladders, pumps, fire rescue units and urban search and rescue appliances (USAR). These centres would allow much better management and maintenance of the highly specialised skills required. Like the Bulk Extinguishing Materials Centres, there may be opportunities for alternate crewing at these centres and we will examine this further.
- Reducing the number of incident response units which are whole time crewed from four to two with one of the remaining vehicles being alternately crewed and the other being redeployed to the Safety Skills Team in Training.
- Building on the services provided by the London Local Authority Co-ordination Centre (LLACC) through the expansion of the groups with which the LLACC can work and the support which the LLACC can give to the local authority Gold arrangements. We will also be arguing for the Regulations to be amended to include specific reference to the role of the LLACC and our responsibilities to put in place and maintain such arrangements.
- The establishment of new headline targets for the period 2010/11 to 2012/13 about reducing fires which cause harm or damage property; reducing arson; and reducing call outs to nonemergency incidents. Each will have two components, the first being the level of reduction we reasonably believe we can achieve and the second being a stretch target which is more challenging and which is likely to require substantial changes to the way we deliver our services.
- Continuing to ensure that building owners and occupiers and those that manage nondomestic buildings comply with fire safety laws by: influencing designers and planners to "design out" fire and build-in appropriate warning systems; inspecting buildings which pose the greatest risk to safety from fire and by providing guidance and advice on compliance with the legislation.
