variable crewing project: wholetime shift review - kent fire and rescue service · 2014-09-18 ·...

Variable Crewing Project: Wholetime Shift Review

1

Towards 2020

Variable Crewing project: Review of the wholetime shift duty system

This is a Technical Appendix to the 2013 Safety Plan


2


3

Contents

Contents ................................................................................................................................... 3

Introduction ............................................................................................................................... 5

Project Assumptions .............................................................................................................. 5

Scope of Review ................................................................................................................... 6

Background ............................................................................................................................... 7

Current conditions of Service ................................................................................................. 8

Calculation methodology and rationale ................................................................................ 11

Duty Hours .......................................................................................................................... 11

Leave entitlement ................................................................................................................ 12

Base Option: Existing arrangements ....................................................................................... 14

Description .......................................................................................................................... 14

SWOT Analysis ................................................................................................................... 15

Current Costs ...................................................................................................................... 16

Scope for change .................................................................................................................... 17

Area 1: Conversion of wholetime shift fire engines to another duty system, or their removal

from the fleet ....................................................................................................................... 17

Area 2: Self-rostering ........................................................................................................... 17

Area 3: Banked Shifts .......................................................................................................... 18

Area 4: Reduce crew numbers ............................................................................................ 19

Area 5: Personnel Reserve duty system .............................................................................. 19

Options ................................................................................................................................ 20

Option 1: Change some whole-time shift fire stations to wholetime day-crewed to reduce

numbers of firefighters ............................................................................................................ 21

Description .......................................................................................................................... 21

SWOT Analysis ................................................................................................................... 22

Indicative costs .................................................................................................................... 23

Option 2: Apply self-rostering to wholetime shift stations ......................................................... 24

Description .......................................................................................................................... 24

SWOT Analysis ................................................................................................................... 26

Option 3: Implement a new duty system increasing the number of watches to five (five watch

duty system) ........................................................................................................................... 27


4

Description .......................................................................................................................... 27

SWOT Analysis ................................................................................................................... 29


Option 4: Reduce the number of fire engines but keep the ridership factor ............................. 31

Description .......................................................................................................................... 31

SWOT Analysis ................................................................................................................... 32


Option 5: Reduce watch strength by one at every wholetime shift fire station. ........................ 34

Description .......................................................................................................................... 34

SWOT Analysis ................................................................................................................... 35


Option 6: Implement a new Personnel Reserve duty system to dynamically overcome crewing

deficiencies ............................................................................................................................. 37

SWOT Analysis ................................................................................................................... 38


Evaluation and Summary ........................................................................................................ 40

Recommendations .................................................................................................................. 42


5

Introduction

1. In 2012 Kent and Medway Fire and Rescue Authority commissioned a project to explore

different ways of using staff to provide emergency cover. This followed previous work to

establish the locations fire engines were required to meet risk, demand and isolation

factors across the County. This work was published in 2011, and is available on our

website. This new project, referred to as the Variable Crewing Project, is designed to

identify the most effective and efficient ways of staffing all fire engines across Kent and

Medway. The project is divided into a number of workstreams which allow each duty

system to be challenged in turn.

2. The context of the project is to make a significant contribution to the savings the Authority

needs to make over the next three financial years. Every area of back room cost

reduction has been explored, resulting in staff reductions across the Authority, including

the compulsory redundancy of some non uniformed members of staff. The objective of

this review is to see where savings can be made by working in a different way to reduce

the overall numbers of uniformed shift firefighters. At this time, any reduction in the

numbers of uniformed staff is planned through the anticipated retirement profile of our

current workforce, although the future prospect of redundancies cannot be ruled out in

the longer term.

3. An impact assessment specific to this element of the project has been completed and

considered when developing options (see Annex 1). In order to allow a comparison

between options presented the strengths and weaknesses of the current wholetime shift

duty system have also been explored.

4. Throughout this document reference is made to positive hours. Positive hours are those

where a firefighter is actually at a fire station or with the crew on the fire engine in the

local area1.

Project Assumptions

5. The following assumptions have been made when conducting this work:

The review extends to all 12 fire stations currently working the wholetime shift

system, and looks forward to when the new wholetime shift station at Rochester

is anticipated to be operational in late 2014;

Current operational procedures are followed;

Levels of staffing are based on establishment figures and may not reflect actual

numbers of firefighters at stations;

1 Other duty systems used by the Authority employ standby and on-call hours. In the case of the

day-crewed duty system, this is alongside positive hours. Under standby and on-call arrangements firefighters respond from nearby homes to emergency calls. They travel to the fire station, collect the fire engine and then travel to the incident, within five minutes of being alerted.


6

Any savings described may not be cashable savings – resources may be

redeployed elsewhere in Kent and Medway rather than being surplus to

requirements; and

Crewing fire engines with four firefighters is used when examining staffing levels

Scope of Review

6. The review has been commissioned as part of the Variable Crewing project to review the

current shift duty system as operated at 12 fire stations across the County. The review

focused on:

Continuing to match resources to risk, demand and isolation as defined by the

Review of Emergency Response Provision;

To ensure an effective and efficient system of work for the delivery of the

Authority’s services;

To ensure the service delivery model reflects the operational requirements of

fire stations within their operational clusters; and

To consider value for money principles at all times.

7. Wholetime firefighters employed in the Urban Search and Rescue Team at Maidstone

and at the Channel Tunnel fire station are out of the scope of this review.

8. This review assessed the suitability of the wholetime shift duty system in being able to

deliver emergency cover as set by the Review of Emergency Response Provision; and if

considered necessary, developed and implemented a series of recommendations for

alterations to the duty system. Outcomes will be applied uniformly across all stations

using the current wholetime shift duty system.

9. The project will not determine the levels of emergency cover required in the area.


7

Background

10. The wholetime shift duty system is one of three working patterns operated by the

Authority for firefighters and provides wholetime availability by means of positive hours

worked at fire stations. There are currently twelve wholetime shift fire stations across the

County. This is made up of five fire stations with two fire engines2 (known as multi-pump

stations) and seven with one fire engine.3 This arrangement will change when the new

station is built at Rochester, taking the total of multi-pump stations to four and single

pump stations to nine. Current crewing numbers are detailed below in Table 1.

11. Wholetime shift fire stations are in the larger towns where risk and demand has

traditionally been deemed high enough to warrant fire engines permanently crewed by

firefighters that are always at the station and immediately available to respond. The levels

of activity are such that crews undertake a single shift and have a distinct off duty period

before commencing the next, to ensure they remain fit for duty. Some stations have a

single fire engine (one pump), others two (multi pump).

12. Each multi-pump station has four watches of thirteen staff comprising ten firefighters, two

crew managers and one watch manager. This is referred to as the ‘watch strength’ or

‘establishment’. Each single pump station has four watches of seven staff, consisting of

five firefighters, one crew manager and one watch manager. At the current time, Medway

fire station has 14 firefighters per watch, and Ashford and Ramsgate have ten. This is to

allow for the crewing of height vehicles and other special appliances based at these fire

stations.

13. Throughout this document, the watch composition is generically referred to as

‘firefighters.’ At the time of writing, some watches on wholetime shift stations are below

these levels through recent retirements or cases of long-term sickness. Some wholetime

shift fire stations have an on-call fire engine attached to them, although this arrangement

is out of scope for this review.

14. There are some specialist vehicles located on wholetime shift stations which perform a

variety of specialist functions. These are also summarised in Table 1.

2 Current multi-pump stations are Dartford, Thames-side, Medway, Maidstone and Canterbury.

3 Current single pump stations are Strood, Tunbridge Wells, Ashford, Folkestone, Dover, Margate

and Ramsgate.


8

Table 1: Fire engines, special appliances and staff numbers at shift stations

Station Fire engines Special

appliances

Number of wholetime

shift firefighters4 Whole-time On-call

Ashford 1 1 3 40

Dover 1 1 1 28

Folkestone 1 1 1 28

Dartford 2 1 52

Thames-side 2 2 52

Strood 1 1 28

Medway 2 1 2 56

Maidstone 2 2 52

Tunbridge Wells 1 1 1 28

Canterbury 2 2 52

Margate 1 1 0 28

Ramsgate 1 1 2 40

15. Running concurrently to this review is the review of working at height, a workstream of

the Operational Capability review. This review makes recommendations on the number

of height vehicles required by the Authority. At the time of writing, the review is proposing

to reduce the number to three height vehicles in total, and for them to be based at

Maidstone and Canterbury with a third for the purposes of resilience based at Ashford. It

also recommends that they are crewed ‘alternately’ with a fire engine. This means that

current posts in the establishment that crew the height vehicles permanently will be

removed. Although the locations of height vehicles is out of scope for this review, the

resultant issues relate to potentially ‘spare’ firefighters being released as a result of the

reduction in height vehicles and how they are crewed has been factored in. This means

that costs and budgets savings discussed in this document will include separate figures

regarding reducing the numbers of staff from the working at height review and the

variable crewing project. The Technical Appendix ‘Working at Height’ can be accessed at

http://www.kent.fire-uk.org/pdf/pp_sp2014_ta_oc_height.pdf.

Current conditions of Service

16. This particular duty system does not require the staff to live within a close proximity of the

station as they only work positive hours. This is in contrast to the day-crewed duty

system, which is considered for change in the day-crewed technical appendix.

Firefighters at shift stations work a ‘two days, two nights, four days off’ duty system which

ensures the fire engine is available wholetime 365 days of the year.

4 ‘Numbers of shift firefighters’ refers to establishment figures, and may not reflect actual numbers of

firefighters working at the station at the time of publication of this document. Budgets are based on establishment figures.

http://www.kent.fire-uk.org/pdf/pp_sp2014_ta_oc_height.pdf


9

17. Traditionally, crewing a single pump station has been based on five firefighters riding a

fire engine multiplied by a ‘ridership factor’ of 1.42. This results in seven firefighters on

each of the four watches on a single fire engine wholetime shift station. On a fire station

with two full-time fire engines, there are 13 firefighters per watch, based on the second

engine being ridden by four firefighters. The ridership factor was designed to cover

sickness, training and annual leave. On occasions where all the firefighters report for

duty, they are detached to other stations where riding positions are available.

18. Where changes to the wholetime shift system are proposed, the extract below from the

Fire Services’ National Schemes of Conditions of Service (Grey Book 6th Edition SOCOS)

sets out the framework for negotiations:


10

‘the following duty system shall continue to operate until replaced or supplemented locally by new

systems under the following terms;

‘Duty systems will need to meet the requirements of the fire and rescue authority’s Integrated Risk

Management Plan (in Kent this is known as the Safety Plan). Any proposed system should be

discussed with the recognised trade unions and be based on the following principles:

Basic working hours should average forty-two per week (inclusive of three hours of meal breaks in

every twenty-four hours) for full-time employees. Hours of duty should be pro-rata for part-time

employees.

There should be at least two periods of twenty-four hours free from duty each week.

It should comply with relevant United Kingdom and European law, Including the Working Time

Regulations 1998, and Health, Safety and Welfare at Work legislation.

It should have regard to the special circumstances of individual employees and be family friendly.

Where, following discussion, there is no agreement between the Fire and Rescue authority and

recognised trade union over a proposed duty system (and it does not accord with the principles of

any of the existing national duty systems at paragraphs 7 to 16 below) the difference can be referred

by either party to the NJC’s Technical Advisory Panel. The Panel will be chaired by an Independent

Expert (appointed on a three-yearly basis by the NJC), who will be assisted by the Joint Secretaries.

The Panel will seek to broker an agreement between the parties, but where that is not possible it will

make recommendations. The Panel’s recommendations will ensure that the duty system follows the

four principles set out at paragraph 3 above and is compatible with the deployment of resources that

the fire and rescue authority has determined is necessary to implement its Integrated Risk

Management Plan. This process will be concluded within one month of reference to the Panel, or

longer with the agreement of the parties. The parties will decide their responses to any

recommendations from the Panel within fourteen days of receipt’.

Shift duty system (para seven SOCOS)

The hours of duty of full time employees on this system shall be an average of 42 per week. The

rota will be based on the following principles:

1) Each period of 24 hours shall be divided into a day shift and a night shift

2) The night shift shall not be less than 12 hours.

3) There shall be at least two complete periods of 24 hours free from duty each week.

4) Leave days shall change week by week in a regular progressive manner.

5) No rota system shall include continuous duty periods of 24 hours.

6) Three hours shall be specified for meals breaks in every 24 hours.

The timing of these periods is at the discretion of the Authority. Account shall be taken of

meal breaks interrupted by emergency calls’.


11

Calculation methodology and rationale

19. The following section details the methodology for the calculation of hours worked, for the

purposes of assessing feasibility of change options and compliance with the National

Schemes of Conditions of Service. It is important to understand the methods and

calculations used as they will be consistently applied through the options appraisals later

in this document.

Duty Hours

20. Currently the duty hours worked at station are 42 hours per week averaged over an eight

week period, which meets the National Schemes and Conditions of Service. (Grey Book

6th Edition). The duty system consists of two, consecutive nine hour days 09:00-18:00

followed by two consecutive 15 hour nights 18:00-09:00. This is followed by four

consecutive days off. Table 2 illustrates current working arrangements of wholetime shift

fire stations.

Table 2: working hours over an eight week period on wholetime shift fire stations

Mon Tues Wed Thurs Fri Sat Sun Total

D N D N D N D N D N D N D N D N

Week 1 9 9 15 15 18 30

Week 2 9 9 15 15 18 30

Week 3 9 9 15 15 18 30

Week 4 9 9 15 15 18 30

Week 5 9 9 15 18 15

Week 6 15 9 9 18 15

Week 7 15 15 9 9 30

Week 8 9 15 15 9 30

D – Day duty positive hours

N – Night duty positive hours

Total

Total hours per 8 weeks

Average working week (336 ÷ 8)

126

336

42

210


12

21. For the purpose of evaluating and calculating hours as part of the review, the hours in

this eight week cycle have been multiplied out to ‘annualise’ the hours, as a basis for

option appraisal calculations. This is shown in Table 3:

Table 3: Annualisation of 42 hour week

Positive hours over 8 weeks

(from table 2)

Number of 8 week cycles per

year (365 ÷ 56 days)

Total number of positive

hours worked

336 X 6.517 = 2190(rounded up)

Average hours per week Number of weeks per year

(365 ÷ 7)

42 X 52.14 = 2190(rounded up)

Leave entitlement

22. Currently firefighters are entitled to 42 days annual leave per year. This is comprised of

25 days of annual leave, five ‘scale B’ days, three long service days (after five years

service), eight public holidays and one Christmas concessionary day.

23. The 25 days of annual leave is divided into three blocks of 14 days, six days and five

days. These blocks cannot be separated which means that some of the leave days are

taken when firefighters are rostered to be on a rota day (i.e. would be off duty anyway).

This anomaly was allowed for when the number of leave days for this duty system was

agreed. If the block booking system was not in use, it is possible to reduce the annual

leave allowance by the nine rota days taken as annual leave, without affecting the hours

worked by firefighters.

24. The following tables show how annual leave is used on rota days.

25. During the 14 day annual leave, six will always be non-working days, and therefore the

14 day annual leave represent eight shifts absent not 14 (Table 4).

Table 4: 14 day annual leave

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

D D N N R R R R D D N N R R

26. During the six day annual leave, two will always be non-working days; therefore the six

day annual leave represent four shifts absent not six, as shown below.


13

Table 5: Six day annual leave

27. During the five day annual leave, one will always be a non-working day; therefore the five

day annual leave represents four shifts absent not five (Table 6).

Table 6: Five day annual leave

1 2 3 4 5

D D D D R

28. The remaining leave days can all be taken as single days, or be booked in blocks of up to

four days in a row.

29. In summary, for firefighters working the shift duty system, 42 days of annual leave

account for 33 rostered duty periods. The balance being used up when they are not

scheduled to be on duty.

1 2 3 4 5 6

D D D D R R


14

Base Option: Existing arrangements

Description

30. All technical appendices to the Safety Plan have a base option, against which any

proposals can be compared. The following analysis evaluates the impact of making no

changes to the existing shift system, so stations would carry on working their current shift

patterns with no changes to watch structures.

31. Table 7 shows the shift crewing for each wholetime fire station, forming the service wide

wholetime shift establishment. This is the figure used in the preparation of budgets.

Table 7: Wholetime shift establishment

Station Firefighters

Ashford 40

Dover 28

Folkestone 28

Dartford 52

Thames-side 52

Strood 28

Medway 56

Maidstone 52

Tunbridge Wells 28

Canterbury 52

Margate 28

Ramsgate 40

Total Shift Establishment 484


15

SWOT Analysis

Strengths Weaknesses Opportunities Threats

Existing system has the

benefit of staff familiarity

Gives a stable workforce

Provides immediately

available, highly trained and

experienced firefighters

wholetime across Kent &

Medway

Limits the flexibility in contractual offers which can be made to firefighters.

Recruitment into the system is needed to maintain current establishment levels

Expensive to maintain

No change to the shift system makes no contribution to the overall requirement for the Service to generate £10m of savings in the next three years, creating risk of overrunning financial capacity


16

Current Costs

32. The current budgeted costs of the wholetime shift system across the 12 stations are

£18,166,800 for the financial year ending 31 March 2014. This includes wages and

employer costs (National Insurance and pension contributions). This figure excludes

28 Firefighter posts associated with crewing height vehicles that are currently in the

establishment. Expenditure on premises, utilities, vehicles etc is also excluded from

this figure.

33. There are currently 17 wholetime shift fire engines in the fleet. Each fire engine

therefore has an approximate cost of £1,068,000 per annum


17

Scope for change

Area 1: Conversion of wholetime shift fire engines to another duty

system, or their removal from the fleet

34. The review team were conscious that underpinning all work in the 2020 programme is

the need to meet the Authority’s requirement to save £10m in the coming three years.

It was also conscious that it had recently published the results of the Review of

Emergency Response Provision, which set out how the Authority would provide

emergency services across the County based on the factors of risk, demand and

isolation. Aligning these two factors is a critical consideration. To meet the financial

challenge, relatively straightforward steps could be taken to reduce the size of the

Authority’s overall fleet, and alongside this, remove firefighting posts. The review team

felt it was important to consider these, not least because there is a risk that further,

more significant savings will be required in the future, which might require revision to

the outcomes of the Review of Emergency Response Provision.

35. These options are summarised in the Safety Plan, and subject to an options appraisal

later in this document. The first is the conversion of a number of wholetime shift fire

stations to the day-crewed duty system. The second was the removal of a number of

wholetime shift fire engines from the fleet. This would be most likely to happen at multi-

pump stations. The impacts of both options have been assessed.

Area 2: Self-rostering

36. Self-rostering is a concept that is currently being proposed for wholetime day-crewed

firefighters. As part of this review, consideration has been given to whether self

rostering can be extended (with some adaptations) to wholetime shift stations at some

point in the future.

37. Self-rostering is a method of providing enough firefighters to crew a fire engine based

on a principle of local management arrangements. As long as certain criteria are met,

the hours that an individual firefighter works will be primarily managed through local

discussions with work colleagues, rather than central imposition and rigid systems. It

allows staff some flexibility around the days they work each week within agreed

parameters and managed through our workforce planning system. The concept

assumes that the system is managed locally by the supervisory managers with each

watch manager having overall responsibility for crewing the fire engine.

38. There are a number of fire and rescue authorities using different forms of self-rostering

to crew fire engines. These include Mid & West Wales, Lancashire, Leicestershire,

Nottinghamshire, and Merseyside. The models used in these areas have all been

examined as part of this review, by way of site research, conversation or exchange of


18

documentation. The review team noted that these services had used self rostering in a

day-crewed rather than shift setting.

39. One of the services was specifically selected for research as they employ the same

workforce planning system as the Authority.

40. The review explored the potential to introduce a system of self-rostering, giving

firefighters the freedom to provide cover using local arrangements within a framework

of parameters. The arrangements will aim to achieve self-sufficiency on shift stations,

meaning that specialist skills are always available for the different vehicles located

there, and detached duties out to or in from other stations to make up crewing

shortages will be required rarely, if at all.

41. Self rostering and flexible working forms the basis of another alternative wholetime

duty system using five watches instead of four, with a crewing level of four per watch.

In this concept, all leave, training and other abstractions are covered by members of

other watches in a flexible way, using surplus contracted hours held by firefighters for

this purpose, similar to banked shifts, explained in the following section.

Area 3: Banked Shifts

42. The concept of banked shifts is that they are a product of self rostering using an

annual total of the hours of duty each firefighter is contracted to work for. In the context

of wholetime shift they would work in a different way to day-crewed self rostering,

although the working operation of banked shifts is not fully developed at this stage and

subject to further research.

43. Banked Shifts are the hours (converted to shifts) that are in excess of those required

for crewing a fire engine. These shifts originate from the annualisation of a 42 positive

hour working week. They have therefore already been paid for by the Authority and so

are held as a balance ‘banked’, to be used up when staff attend prearranged station-

based or external training, medicals or other abstractions when not rostered for

crewing duty.

44. Balances of banked shifts will be agreed at the start of each leave year. Although not

expected, in the event of staff overrunning their allocated number of banked shifts, any

additional hours worked through training or other duties will be paid at flat rate. At the

end of the leave period, any banked shifts left in the balances of individuals will be

written off prior to ‘resetting’ the arrangements at the beginning of the next year.

45. There is a relationship between the number of staff on a self-rostered section, the

different levels of positive hours in a shift, and the number of banked shifts generated.

The elements of the relationship are simply defined as:


19

The greater the number of staff operating the same length of shift, the more

banked shifts are generated

The shorter the shift applied to a fixed number of staff, the greater number of

banked shifts are generated

46. In the case of wholetime shift, banked shifts will be complex to reconcile, given the

current nine hour day shift and fifteen hour night. If the idea progresses, further work

will need to be undertaken in this area.

Area 4: Reduce crew numbers

47. The Authority has proposed the formal removal of the ridership factor5 (although in

practice it has not been used for several years). It is now looking to crew fire engines

with four firefighters. This, combined with the potential for self rostering with fewer staff

in the future, enables the reduction in the number of firefighters at each shift station,

with no impact on the service which members of the public receive, or removing fire

engines from service.

Area 5: Personnel Reserve duty system

48. There are already times where the Authority experiences crewing shortages. This is a

result of staff abstraction for statutory training such as driving courses, long and short

term sickness and temporary promotions. Shortages are exacerbated in the summer

months which naturally are the most popular for the taking of annual leave. This

Authority does not roster leave to create an even spread across the course of a year,

some others do. Rostering of leave is out of the scope of this review, but the impact of

leave on crewing will be examined in the future to fully establish how it interacts with

the current crewing system or any future proposed changes to it. The review

recognises that a reduction in wholetime firefighter numbers may increase crewing

shortages unless efficient ways of managing the hours they work are developed and

implemented.

49. The concept of a personnel reserve duty system is to provide a resource to assist in

times of crew depletion at any station either at short notice or for longer term periods of

crewing. (e.g. long term sickness). Some shifts will be allocated in advance, but the

system will be designed to provide enough flexibility to allocate shifts on any given day

and despatch staff to provide crewing cover where it is needed.

50. Careful consideration will be necessary in the construction of a personnel reserve. The

members must be flexible enough to travel across Kent and Medway for various

5 Currently for each position available on an appliance riding at standard crewing (five), we

employ 1.42 staff, this is to cover sickness, training etc


20

duties, sometimes at short notice. The correct balance and range of skills must be

achieved in order that individuals can perform a wide range of tasks. This brings a high

commitment to training and maintaining competence across a wide range of fire

service equipment and procedures.

51. In recognition of the extra commitment and flexibility required from members of the

personnel reserve, an enhanced rate of pay is envisaged.

Options

52. The remainder of this document sets out the options that have been developed for the

future of the wholetime shift system. The options considered were:

Option 1:Change some wholetime shift fire stations to wholetime day-crewed to

reduce numbers of firefighters;

Option 2: Apply self rostering to wholetime shift stations to achieve staff reductions;

Option 3: Implement a new duty system increasing the watches to five (five watch

duty system);

Option 4: Reduce the number of fire engines but keep the ridership factor;

Option 5: Reduce watch strength by one at every wholetime shift fire station

Option 6: Implement a new Personnel Reserve duty system to dynamically

overcome crewing deficiencies


21

Option 1: Change some whole-time shift fire stations to

wholetime day-crewed to reduce numbers of firefighters

Description

53. This option considers changing some wholetime shift stations to wholetime day-crewed

stations. The variable crewing project has reviewed the wholetime day-crewed system.

The technical appendix for the day-crewed review can be accessed from

http://www.kent.fire-uk.org/pdf/pp_sp2014_ta_dsr_dc.pdf.

54. The context of the day-crewed review has been set against the existing workforce in

their own accommodation local to their fire station, or in housing provided by the

Authority. In this sense, this option applied to wholetime shift firefighters poses a

fundamental problem of accommodation, as shift firefighters do not live within a

suitable distance of stations to provide a five minute response time.

55. Other UK fire and services have created stations with enhanced self contained

accommodation for firefighters. Under these arrangements, a wholetime day-contract

and an on-call night contract is utilised, with the firefighters only occupying the

accommodation when they are rostered for on-call duty. The Authority has taken the

view that this scheme, known as ‘day-crewed plus’, amounts to continuous duty, but

without appropriate time for firefighters to spend with their families in a conventional

domestic setting, a facility currently available in the Authority’s day-crewed system.

There is also concern around this style of working compiling with working time

regulations. Therefore, ‘day-crewed plus’ has been discounted as an option from this

review.

56. The Authority has also chosen to reduce the tenancies it currently provides at day-

crewed fire stations through natural wastage as staff retire from the Authority. With this

in mind the purchase or building of new housing around existing or planned fire

stations would be contradictory to this intention.

57. The previous paragraphs indicate that turning a wholetime shift station to day-crewed

is not a simple matter, and would involve a number of firefighters moving house or

making private arrangements for accommodation when performing ‘on-call’ duty at

night.

58. Another option considered is utilising wholetime firefighters for the periods of peak

demand during the daytime and evening, with the fire engine changing to ‘on-call’

arrangements at night. There are a number of stations in Kent and Medway that have

a wholetime shift and an on-call fire engine. This would effectively merge the two

separate sections into crewing one fire engine instead of two, reducing the number of

fire engines in the fleet.

http://www.kent.fire-uk.org/pdf/pp_sp2014_ta_dsr_dc.pdf


22

SWOT Analysis


Contributes to the financial savings required by the Authority

Maintains highly trained and experienced firefighters in areas of greatest risk and demand

Difficult to implement in terms of accommodation

Potential in the future to

recruit firefighters for specific

stations under pre-set

contract conditions of where

they live.

Insufficient uptake by current staff

Changes in fire and rescue cover are subject to formal consultation processes, which if not followed give rise to judicial review

Rapid establishment reduction is likely to exceed natural wastage, giving rise to compulsory redundancy


23

Indicative costs

59. The current day-crewed system crews a single fire engine with 14 firefighters, at a cost

of £662,400 including retaining, turnout and attendance fees. The base option in this

document for a single fire engine crewed on a wholetime shift basis indicates 28

firefighters at a cost of £1,136,200. This figure is slightly different from the £1,068,000

quoted earlier, as multi pump stations do not have exactly double the numbers of

firefighters as a single pump. Every wholetime shift fire engine that converts to day-

crewing would create a saving of £473,800 per annum in base wages, national

insurance and pension costs. There would, however, be additional costs in any future

consolidated pay arrangements for the on-call element of the working hours, or high

turnout and attendance fees as the wholetime stations are situated in our busiest

areas. These costs have not been fully assessed at this stage of the review.


24

Option 2: Apply self-rostering to wholetime shift stations

Description

60. This option involves removing the four watches on wholetime shift stations, creating a

single section that operates on a flexible self rostered basis. This option has been

explored in terms of the numerical relationships that exist between shift length, the

annual amount of working hours that firefighters are contracted for, and the number of

surplus hours that are created to enable training away from station duties, to cover

sickness and other uses. This concept has been examined at wholetime day-crewed

stations as part of the variable crewing project, and is more developed there than for

wholetime shift stations. Initial parameters and guidance for self rostering are

appended to the review of the day-crewed shift duty system. They are not finite, but

serve as a general indicator as to the spirit and governance necessary to implement

such a system.

61. Through self-rostering and local management it is expected that this option will provide

a degree of self-sufficiency for shift stations. This means that staff will always have the

necessary skills to keep special appliances available at all times. With the expectation

of self-sufficiency at shift stations, it is anticipated that shift firefighters will not be used

for detached duties to make up shortfalls on other stations. Self-sufficiency also means

that interoperability between duty systems referred to in the scope of the variable

crewing project only has to function in terms of attendance at operational incidents.

62. A self rostered single section has the potential to achieve staff reductions across the

wholetime shift workforce. Initial calculations around the numbers of banked shifts

generated by different staffing levels and the associated cost savings have been

completed ranging from 23 down to 20 staff for a one pump station and 45 to 40 for

multi pump. The results of these are summarised in Table 8.


25

Table 8: Summary of initial calculations for self rostered single section applied to

wholetime shift one pump station

Number of Staff

Post reductions Banked shifts

generated

Estimated

savings from

base case of

52 or 28 Staff

Multi pump £

45 1 WM 1 CM 5 FF 20 275,900

44 1 WM 1CM 6 FF 17 313,400

43 1 WM 1 CM 7 FF 15 350,900

42 1 WM 1 CM 8 FF 11 388,400

41 1 WM 1 CM 9 FF 8 425,900

40 1 WM 1 CM 10 FF 4 463,400

One pump

23 2 WM 3 FF 23 205,900

22 2 WM 4 FF 17 243,400

21 2 WM 5 FF 11 280,900

20 2 WM 6 FF 4 318,400


26

63. The following SWOT analysis is generic to the principle of self rostering, incorporating issues associated with larger and smaller numbers

of staff outlined in Table 8.

SWOT Analysis


Ensures staff are permanently available on station so no impact on service delivery

Built in resilience utilising designated Banked shifts and principle of self sufficiency

Achieves financial savings through a reduction in staff numbers

Reduction in establishment numbers complements current and future retirement profiles

Initial management & audit process becomes more onerous, more time consuming for supervisory managers and Group

Too smaller numbers of staff may lead to unmanageable crewing shortages

Ownership by staff of self rostering system

More flexible for staff

Integration of staff

Banked shifts being used for station training events attended by all station staff

Lack of staff engagement and resistance to proposals

Other difficulties associated with change management


27

Option 3: Implement a new duty system increasing the number of

watches to five (five watch duty system)

Description

64. This option considered an alternative method of crewing wholetime shift stations. A new

working pattern is created, another watch is added to make five in total, and the ridership

factor is removed, leaving each watch rostering a crew of four. The scheme is known to

be operating successfully already in an industrial setting within Kent and Medway.

Fundamental to this system is the concept that all annual leave has been absorbed into

the rota so there is no formal provision for taking time off. When a firefighter needs to be

absent from rostered duty, cover will need to be sought by that individual making

arrangements with off duty staff on a flexible basis.

65. This scheme provides six days between finishing a tour of duty and beginning the next,

as shown below:

Mon Tues Wed Thurs Fri Sat Sun Total

D N D N D N D N D N D N D N D N

Wk 1 9 9 15 15 18 30

Wk 2 9 9 15 15 18 30

Wk 3 9 18 30

Wk 4 9 15 15 9 30

Wk 5 9 9 15 15 18 30

Wk 6 9 9 18 0

Wk 7 15 15 15 0

Wk 8 9 9 15 15 18 30

Wk 9 9 9 15 18 15

Wk 10 15 0 15

Total 360 120 210


28

66. The following section reconciles the scheme against hours currently worked under the

National Schemes of Conditions of Service;

Number of hours worked per ten week period 360

Multiplied by the ten week periods per year 5.2

Total hours worked per year under five watch scheme 1,872

Hours worked under current scheme (Base Option) 2,190

Less: Hours not worked for Scale A annual leave (192)

Less: Hours not worked for other leave 6 (204)

Total actual hours worked under current scheme 1, 794

67. Both the current and five watch systems have very similar actual weekly working hours;

Current system: 1,794 ÷ 52.14 = 34.4 hours per working week

Five watch system: 1,872 ÷ 52.14 = 35.9 hours per working week

6 It has been assumed that ‘other leave’ is used in equal proportion of day and night shifts for the

purposes of the calculation


29

SWOT Analysis


Ensures staff are permanently available on station so no impact on service delivery

Built in resilience utilising flexible cover arrangements

Achieves financial savings through a reduction in staff numbers

Controlled reduction in establishment numbers complements current and future retirement profiles

Favourable working patterns similar to those at present

Promotes self sufficiency at individual stations, reducing need for detachments

Reduction in establishment numbers exceeds current and future retirement profiles

Increased planning and organising for supervisory managers responsible for crewing

Lack of staff engagement and resistance to proposals

Potentially rapid and significant reduction in establishment may exceed natural wastage giving rise to compulsory redundancies


30

Indicative costs

68. Implementation of a five watch duty system reducing the watch strength to four would be

expected to deliver cost savings of £ 327,600, in wages, pension and national insurance

costs. This figure is based on a structure of one watch manager, four crew managers and

15 firefighter posts. The saving is calculated from a base case of the current structure of

four watches of seven; one watch manager, one crew manager and five firefighters on

each.


31

Option 4: Reduce the number of fire engines but keep the

ridership factor

Description

69. This option examines the potential for leaving the current crewing arrangements in

place and retaining the ridership factor. Simply put, the establishment would be

reduced to a number that delivered the necessary saving and the number of wholetime

shift appliances in service would be derived from this figure.


32

SWOT Analysis


Makes the financial savings required by the Authority.

There is no reference in this option to an assessment of the impact on fire and rescue provision, service delivery and resilience, or performance standards resulting from a drastic reduction in wholetime shift fire engines

Risk of failing to meet our legal duties under the Statutory requirements of Fire Services Act and Civil Contingencies Act

Changes in fire and rescue cover are subject to formal consultation processes, which if not followed give rise to judicial review

Such drastic and rapid establishment reduction is likely to exceed natural wastage, giving rise to compulsory redundancy


33

Indicative costs

70. With overall savings of £10m required over the next three years, and the cost of

crewing wholetime shift fire engines identified earlier in this document as £1,068,000,

the removal of nine wholetime fire engines would achieve this in a single plan. There

are however, several other projects in progress all with budget reductions as a clear

focus. This review must be taken into account with all the other workstreams to form

an integrated financial strategy.


34

Option 5: Reduce watch strength by one at every wholetime

shift fire station.

Description

71. This option is exactly the same as the current arrangements described earlier in this

document as the base option. The only variation is that each watch would reduce in

size by one firefighter. Staff would carry on working their current duty patterns. This

option is closely linked to the proposal by the Authority to remove the ridership factor

and crew fire engines with four firefighters.


35

SWOT Analysis


Easy to manage and audit as little change from current arrangements

Has served the Authority well

for over 40 years

Existing system has the

benefit of staff familiarity

Gives a stable workforce

Results in financial savings through a reduction of 48 firefighter posts

Reduction in establishment numbers complements current and future retirement profiles

The system is not self-sufficient and creates the need for higher numbers of detachments from other stations to cover absences.

Resilience around staff absence and maintaining specialist knowledge is reduced.

No built in resilience utilising the ridership factor.

Potential to redeploy

firefighters into personnel

reserve to cover long or short

term crewing shortages

Explore and quantify impact of

current leave arrangements

on crewing levels


36

Indicative costs

72. Implementation of reducing watch strength by one on each of the 12 shift stations will

result in cost savings of approximately £1,800,000 per annum in base wages, national

insurance and pension costs for 48 firefighter posts. The separate reductions in crewing

proposed by the working at height review reduce the overall establishment by an

additional 28 firefighter posts. This represents an annual saving of £1,049,000.

73. In future, when the new station at Rochester is open the overall cost savings listed above

will be remain the same, explained as follows;

Current

Current Medway Establishment 56

Reduction from height vehicle review (4)

Reduction from Variable crewing (4)

Revised Medway Establishment 48

Future

Single pump Medway Establishment 24

Single pump Rochester Establishment 24

Total Establishment 48


37

Option 6: Implement a new Personnel Reserve duty system to

dynamically overcome crewing deficiencies

74. The concept of a personnel reserve is explained in the ‘scope for change’ section of this

document. The staff employed in the reserve would be managed by the Authority’s

Central Resourcing Team, to undertake various agreed duties at any location in the

County. It is also feasible that in the event of their not being needed to make up crewing

shortages they could form an independent fire engine crew for what would otherwise be

an uncrewed vehicle.

75. It is important to understand that the concept of a personnel reserve is not linked to any

particular option in this document or any from the day-crewed element of the Variable

Crewing project. It is an entirely stand alone proposal that could be implemented at any

time in the future. Further research as part of the project is necessary before finite details

on how the scheme would operate can be produced.


38

SWOT Analysis


Flexible

Staff can cover any duty

system in operation

The system is not self-sufficient and creates the need for higher numbers of detachments from other stations to cover absences.

Resilience around staff absence and maintaining specialist knowledge is reduced.

No built in resilience utilising the ridership factor.

Potential to redeploy

firefighters into personnel

reserve to cover long or short

term crewing shortages

Explore and quantify impact of

current leave arrangements

on crewing levels


39

Indicative costs

76. Initial thoughts around the implementation of the personnel reserve are based around six

firefighters competent in a wide range of operational skills including driving, pump

operation, incident command, breathing apparatus and suitable knowledge of a wide

range of specialist vehicles. This number is not finite. The reserve may grow in size in the

future.

77. The six ‘personnel reserve’ will result in costs of approximately £250,200 per annum in

base wages, national insurance and pension costs, assuming they are paid at crew

manager rate in order to provide incident command capability. This is a cost to the

Authority so will need to be treated as offsetting savings that are made from other areas

in this or other reviews. The team is also likely to incur additional costs related to travel,

and training costs. These are not expected to be prohibitive, and can be contained within

existing budgets.


40

Evaluation and Summary

78. This evaluation summarises the findings of the review so far, taking each option in turn as

presented in this document.

79. The base option as described has served the Authority well for many years, but

represents the most expensive form of service delivery. With other areas of financial

saving having been explored and implemented, the review team is of the view that some

savings must be made from wholetime shift budgets in view of the need to save £10m

over the next three years. Furthermore, there are no guarantees that further budget

reductions will not be required, so additional contingencies against this possibility should

continue to be considered as part of the on-going Variable Crewing project. On this basis,

leaving the existing arrangements as they are is not considered a viable option.

80. The conversion of wholetime shift stations as described in Option 1 brings with it certain

difficulties around accommodation for staff and high levels of activity in busier areas and

the associated payments that would be generated. The concept of day-crewed plus is not

considered a suitable operating system by the Authority. It would also be a breach of due

process to implement such changes to fire and rescue cover without an assessment of

risk and impacts, subjected to a public consultation process. For these reasons this

option is not viable at the current time, but future implementation is not ruled out. An

additional option considered by the Review Team was the conversion of some wholetime

fire engines at multi-pump fire stations to on-call arrangements. This would have a

significant financial benefit. However, it fundamentally alters the outcomes of the review

of emergency cover published in 2011, and making significant amendments to that was

out of scope for the review. If it is deemed necessary in order to make future savings,

then a further Review of Emergency Response will need to be completed

81. A self-rostering single section to replace four wholetime shift watches is described in

Option 2. Whilst the calculations around hours and working time can be completed, the

idea of applying the scheme to wholetime shift stations is not developed enough to form a

proposal at the present time. The proposals around self rostering for wholetime day-

crewed stations in the current safety plan have been considered and discussed with staff

at those stations and joint working groups have been established to consider

implementation. For shift stations, this has not yet taken place. Whilst this option may be

subject to further consideration, it is not a viable proposal at this time.

82. Option 3 describes creating an additional watch and reducing the numbers on what

would be five watches on station to just four firefighters each. This introduces a

completely new method of managing annual leave and a large element of finding cover

locally to maintain crewing levels. This is a drastic change to how wholetime shift stations

operate and is not in a state of development to form a proposal. It is however, closely

linked to the concept of self rostering so may still be considered alongside this in the

future.


41

83. A simple reduction in crew numbers and distributing staff equally across a smaller

number of fire engines using the current ridership factor is discussed in Option 4. In the

same way as turning wholetime shift stations into day-crewed, this option is discounted

immediately by virtue of the fact that fire station locations and numbers have been

publicly consulted upon as part of the Review of Emergency Response Provision in 2011.

Similar assessment will need to be published for consultation before any changes to fire

and rescue provision are made.

84. Option 5 describes reducing every wholetime watch establishment by one firefighter

post. Combined with the proposal to remove the ridership factor and crew to four

firefighters per fire engine, the review team consider that this is a viable option to put

forward as a proposal. There are no significant changes in how the system operates, but

significant savings (48 posts) can be made at this stage whilst further research is done by

the Variable Crewing project to develop future options. It is recognised that some strain

on crewing may result, but this should prompt further work around annual leave, or

developing a personnel reserve to help manage crewing shortages as described in

Option 6.


42

Recommendations

85. The Variable Crewing project team recommends that:

a. Option 5 – to reduce watch strength on every wholetime watch by one

firefighter is implemented, in conjunction with removal of the ridership factor;

b. Option 6 – to develop and implement a Personnel Reserve of highly versatile

and flexible staff to assist in managing crewing shortfalls be implemented;

c. That review work around fire and rescue cover be undertaken to validate the

previous recommendations of the Review of Emergency Response Provision,

and to assess the impacts of various changes to fire and rescue provision in

future years;

d. Day-crewed plus is discounted from the project as a field of research; and

e. Further research and development be undertaken regarding self-rostered

systems at wholetime stations

variable crewing project: wholetime shift review - kent fire and rescue service · 2014-09-18 ·...

Documents