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What happens when the money runs out?
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FIRE Correspondent Catherine Levin reports on the prevention activity in South Yorkshire and in so doing highlights that the broad landscape within which fire prevention work operates has changed with the government’s push for collaboration and changes to governance
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here have been acres of press coverage about the Grenfell Tower fire. The last edition of FIRE was devoted entirely to the fire and its aftermath. In among the discussion about cladding, building regulations and sprinklers there was little about fire safety messages. The constant refrain from the Fire and Rescue Service in recent years has been about prevention, so it seems timely to look at what fire and rescue services are doing in this area and whether the context in which this work now operates changes anything. South Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service (SYFR) is pouring a lot of money into prevention; it comes with a distinctive collaborative flavour and rightly so. In South Yorkshire, the fire authority committed to pump £2m over four years into fire prevention activities to work out what is effective, what is efficient and where collaboration works best. There is something perverse about committing £2m when the SYFR budget reduced £14m (a 25 per cent cut) since 2010. The money comes from the authority’s reserves with the intention that it “reinvests money into local communities to support work to prevent emergencies”. With projects ranging from £5,000 through to £100,000 there is a huge variety in the approaches being taken. Some
are focused on a single city while others reach across the whole SYFR area – with a population of 1.37 million, this is a large metropolitan fire and rescue service serving some very deprived wards. Lots of the work being carried out in South Yorkshire is likely to be found in other fire and rescue services. Partners for Collaboration Steve Helps, Head of Prevention and Protection at SYFR, wonders who the natural partners are for fire: health or police? Steve says it is both. ‘We are collaborating with others to make South Yorkshire safer and we want to be bold in the way we do that.’ He goes on to say: ‘The service has always been proud to keep people safe whatever the circumstances. We’ve always changed and adapted to do that. For me the Fire and Rescue Service has always evolved and it’s right that we use our skilled staff and resources in order to reduce the risks and challenges society faces in order to keep people safe.’ The examples that Steve provides have a strong health focus. He talks enthusiastically about the Dementia Café. Opening up one of the fire stations in Doncaster to a local support organisation, the local staff get to know their community, have a captive audience for fire and other safety messages. It is the kind of thing that fire stations
“We are collaborating with others to make South Yorkshire safer and we want to be bold in the way we do that” 24 | September 2017 | www.fire–magazine.com