Message from Chief Fire Officer, Peter Holland

Welcome to Lancashire Fire and Rescue Service’s website.

Independent watchdog of public sector performance, the Audit Commission, has unstinting praise for the standard of service delivered in its latest Comprehensive Performance Assessment (CPA) of the Lancashire Fire and Rescue Service.

The Comprehensive Performance Assessment (CPA) is an assessment at the corporate level of how well a Fire Authority is being run rather than on how well a Service responds to fires and other incidents, with authorities marked on a five-point scale; ‘Excellent’; ‘Good’; ‘Fair’; ‘Weak’ and ‘Poor’.

The Lancashire Combined Fire Authority has received an overall CPA marking of ‘Good’, defined as performing consistently above minimum requirements in all five assessment categories.

Significantly, the Authority’s implementation of fire prevention and protection measures received a resounding ‘thumbs up’ from the Audit Commission, with recognition for a comprehensive range of service initiatives, including Home Fire Safety Check Visits by firefighters and the utilisation of in-house specialists to provide the necessary insights into the specific needs of clients and communities on issues such as disability, ethnicity, age and gender.

Particular strengths identified in the report were:-

 ·        Strong leadership by officers and elected members and excellent partnership working, with performance standards well managed and maintained

·        A Fire and Rescue Service that is ambitious in facing up to challenging objectives, but clear about what it wants to achieve and capable of achieving those objectives

·        A well-structured Service, employing the right people on the right tasks and with a proven ability to deliver results

·        Extensive and ongoing engagement with local people

·        Highly effective in reducing the risk of death and injury from fire across the county and notably with individuals, businesses and communities that are particularly vulnerable

·        Excellent in sustaining improvement in operational areas including the response to major incidents and fire prevention

·        Achieving a significant reduction in the numbers of fires and deaths and injuries from fires over the last three years

Positive results from our change agenda are already being realised, with much more yet to come, ranging from the benefits of an intensified drive to complete even more Home Fire Safety Check Visits, to our efforts to tackle the needless diversion of vital resources responding to hoax calls and Automatic Fire Alarm alerts.

None of this could of course have been possible without the contribution of each and every one of our staff, the Councillors who form the Lancashire Combined Fire Authority and the many individuals and organisations who work closely in partnership with us.  I am immensely proud to lead such a dedicated and hard-working team.  It is a marvellous testimony to their abilities that their contribution has had such a crucial effect on maintaining the safety and wellbeing of the people we serve, and will continue to do so.