Critical for future success of Service.
With the Fire Service College’s Research and Developments conference on the horizon, FIRE challenges all fire sector supporters to use the event to unite and create a central core for R&D to flourish
As the Chief Fire and Rescue Advisers Unit comes into existence the thorny question of research and development continues to hang over the Fire and Rescue Service. Capacity is stretched already, however:
• The Centre of Excellence is aspiring to forward leadership and training for the Service, which we will feature in forthcoming issues.
• CFOA has task and finish groups exploring every aspect of fire and rescue concerns
•The LGA has spearheaded the ten-year vision
•Communities and Local Government are hitting diversity and equality and performance management as hard as can be expected
•The FBU is championing lifelong learning. The concern is not about a lack of willing contributors to aid the advancement of the Fire and Rescue Service; it is a question of capacity. Who has the ability to pick up the slack?
Critical Research Event
Held in association with the Institution of Fire Engineers, the Fire Service College’s Fire Related Research and Developments (REO7) conference at the end of the year (see pg 30) does not provide all the answers, but it does give a measure of the task ahead.
The organisers have called for papers focusing on multi-agency initiatives and partnership working, a growing strength exhibited by many fire and rescue services. It should prove a rich seam. The call has also gone out for projects on: technical and fire engineering research; audit analysis; leadership issues; effective evaluation methods; governance; employment relations; fire research statistics; integration risk management planning; the application of the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order; civil protection and disaster management; and professional training and development.
It is imperative that research events such as this continue to trail the essential work being carried out independently by fire safety and engineering experts. The Fire Service College, as the Centre of Excellence, is the ideal meeting place for ground-breaking research events, and if it is to meet the Service’s expectations, it must pick up the mantle of fire research and development previewed at such gatherings.
The Strategic Leadership Development programme is also a great opportunity to further vital research, hopefully with consistency and continuity in mind. It also presents a valuable research niche as the Service moves into previously unexplored areas. It is all very well picking up on best practice from outside sectors but it must further learning in vital arenas such as risk management, capability planning and command and control.
On the latter, CFO Paul Hayden, Hereford and Worcester, explains the work of the CFOA Management of Major Flood Events project (see pg 22). If the recommendations of the report are to be implemented it will require multi-agency partnership working on an unprecedented scale. He points out that funding is available for further research to improve resilience and mutual aid at major incidents through the European Commission Directorate for Environment.
The benefits of European funding were evinced at the ADDRESS project’s Transnational Conference (see FIRE January, pg 37), which received support from the Leonardo da Vinci initiative to undertake equality and diversity research which is of valuable assistance to all fire and rescue services, if they choose to explore further.
What Now for Research?
Whilst these funding routes are likely, and rightly, to be further explored, what more can be done to ensure the knowledge, experience and expertise of fire personnel is explored fully? Is there a national research centre coordinating all research and development at present? Not likely.
What has been done to ensure research is held at the fore of developmental activity? Whilst several universities – Lancaster, Greenwich, Edinburgh, Anglia- Ruskin – to name a few, have made great strides on behalf of the Service, there is little by the way of central co-ordination.
The REO7 event this November provides an opportunity for interested parties to meet and discuss the best way to co-ordinate research and development throughout the UK. As the Chief Fire Advisers Unit will have taken shape and the Centre of Excellence begins to forward some of its key themes, the timing could be right.
To support the aspirations of the event, FIRE, in association with W.L.Gore, is presenting an award at the conference for the most challenging and captivating research paper. The winner of the FIRE/Gore Research Excellence Award will also receive £1,000. For more information on submitting papers, see pg. 30. The broader objective for FIRE is to see the centre for research and development be supported by all within the Service, particularly the centre.
ANDREW LYNCH Editor |
