Memorandum from Cllr. Jeremy Hilton (FIRE
15)
1. I was the Cabinet Member for Fire in
Gloucestershire when we opened the TriService Centre in 2003.
Prince Charles was the guest of honour at the official opening.
2. I have consistently opposed the closing
of our TriService Fire Control and moving it 70 miles away
into the regional control centre at Taunton. The RCC takes away
local knowledge, which in my view undermines resilience.
3. The TriService Centre has highlighted
the benefits of inter-service co-operation in Gloucestershire
and the minute-by-minute command of major incidents. Something
that will be damaged by a move to the RCC.
4. Currently the chief fire office can talk
to his control staff face to face. In future, he will have to
pick up the phone to speak to his control staff—what nonsense.
5. The TriService Centre was a pioneering
project supported by the government with a £2.6 million
Invest to Save grant.
6. We opened the TriService on time and
under budget, with a saving of £209,000 on its original
budget of £6.4 million.
7. Inter-service co-operation and intelligence
has improved since the TriService Centre opened as all three 999-control
rooms sit side by side. Concurrent dispatch has improved.
8. The ability to deal with major emergencies
has been enhanced as was shown by the superb way in which the
emergency services worked together during the devastating floods
that hit Gloucestershire in 2007.
9. Gloucestershire has been given a green
flag for dealing with floods by the Audit Commission (9 December
2009) in its report on the Comprehensive Area Assessment for the
county.
10. It only takes five minutes to set up
set up silver command, which operates within the TriService Centre
adjacent to the three 999-control rooms.
11. Gold command operates from the new police
HQ just 100 meters away.
12. The moving of the 999 fire control
to Taunton will undermine the close working relationship built
up between the three blue light services in Gloucestershire since
the TriService Centre opened in 2003.
13. Technical developments have been put
on hold because of the Regional Control Centre project. The communications
infrastructure (radio communications) is now extremely fragile
due to the excessive delays incurred through this national project.
14. The RCC offers no communication advantages
that cannot be plugged and played from the TriService Centre.
The TriService Centre can be fully compatible with data and voice
communications over the new FireLink system.
15. At the LGA Fire Service Management Committee
(November 2009) I asked Roger Hargreaves from CLG whether it was
technically possible to link the TriService Centre and other fire
controls for both data and voice communications with the new FireLink
communications system—he said yes.
16. The reason why we have the RCC project
is more about establishing regional fire authorities than improving
resilience. Regional fire authorities have now been abandoned
and so should the RCC project.
17. In my view, the government should have
from the start, designed new fire control communications architecture
(FireLink) and then asked all fire authorities to upgrade their
fire controls rooms and link into FireLink so that all control
rooms were modernised.
18. Financial inducement could have been
given to encourage joint control rooms where fire authorities
were willing to combine. Similar to the grant we got for the TriService
Centre.
19. The RCC project has been a failure;
it is late, over budget and full of technical problems. Only a
fool would risk handing over 999 calls to the Taunton RCC
and close down our excellent TriService fire control.
20. In Gloucestershire, we should stick
with our TriService fire control, as we know we can trust it to
serve the people of the county.
21. On 30 October 2003, Ian McCartney,
then Minister without Portfolio wrote to Nick Raynsford the fire
minister, following a visit to the TriService Centre, to ask,
"whether there was scope in future plans to retain and develop
the TriService Centre."
22. On 13 November 2003, I wrote to
Nick Raynsford the fire minister to invite him to visit the TriService
Centre to see for himself how well it worked. He never came.
23. The Mott MacDonald report commissioned
by the ODPM—"The Future of the Fire Service Control
Rooms," clearly states that the analysis of the TriService
Project was too early in the project and should be allowed to
proceed. The report recommends that "a medium to long term
plan is derived that considers the integration of the of the three
ISB projects (TriService Centres) into the regional arrangements
at a future point."
24. On 24 May 2004, I met Nick Raynsford
in London to brief him on the TriService Centre and to ask him
to consider plugging the TriService Centre into the new network
of fire controls as Mott MacDonald had suggested—I remain
disappointed that he failed to act on this request.
25. The Audit Commission in a 2005 report
on the TriService Centre said that the TriService Centre had significantly
exceeded expectations in improving public safety, improving safety
of employees; and cost savings.
26. The Audit Commission warned that removal
of the fire control would have a major negative impact on the
project, both financially and operationally.
27. I sit on the LGA Fire Service Management
Committee and at our meeting on September 2009; the committee
decided that is was against the principle of the implementation
of Regional Control Centres.
28. The FSMC also asked LGA officers to
develop alternative options in the event of the RCC failure. It
is now time that CLG did the same. I hope the select committee
will call for the scrapping of the RCC project.
January 2010
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