West Sussex County Council has reacted cautiously to the results of the Audit Commission inspection of how the Fire and Rescue Service is doing in the support areas of its work.

As part of the Governments "modernisation" agenda every Fire & Rescue Service in England has recently undergone their first Corporate Assessment o report on how well they are being run . It is expected that West Sussex will be rated 'Fair' when the report is published in August.

The Audit Commission stress that their report does not reflect on how well the Fire & Rescue Service responds to emergency incidents, but is an assessment of the performance 'behind the scenes' that support the operational response. The assessment of performance was based on information from the 2003/04 year so the results have already been overtaken by progress since then.

Chief Fire Officer Martin Burrell said much of the report was 'very positive' and that West Sussex Fire & Rescue Service had a lot to be proud of, however, he was concerned that the grading of 'fair' given by the Audit Commission gave the wrong impression as to how well West Sussex Fire & Rescue Service were really doing.

"The CPA was a rigorous examination of our management structure and should reassure the public we serve that we are providing a very high standard of service and delivering value for their money. The designation of 'fair' by the Audit Commission does not really reflect the rapid and wide-ranging improvements introduced into the Service. Indeed, of the nine CPA assessment categories, we achieved a rating of 'consistently above average - performing well' in six of them.

"We have an excellent record of dealing with emergencies and have an extremely high level (95%) of customer satisfaction.

"It also closely follows our award earlier this year of a Government Charter Mark , making West Sussex the first UK Fire & Rescue Service to receive the award four times.

"Naturally we will take on board any sections of the report that suggest we can improve in some areas to meet our own very high performance targets. We have already taken steps to underpin some support functions, but we will have to balance resources with costs to the West Sussex taxpayer, concentrating, of course, on providing front-line services."

Lionel Barnard , the West Sussex County Council Cabinet Member with responsibility for the Fire Service added his support saying the Service has a clear vision of what it wants to achieve.

"Following the inspection, the Audit Commission praised the 'effective organisation and leadership' shown by CFO Burrell, his management team, and the County Council. In particular they recognised the effective contribution the Fire & Rescue Service is making to the wider social and community safety agenda and this should be regarded as a good result for West Sussex. Although the Fire & Rescue Service in West Sussex should be rightly proud of its achievements, we were concerned with some aspects of the inspection process undertaken by the Audit Commission and we welcome the changes they are making to the approach in the future.

The report, quite rightly, praises the Service and the County Council for its work and the many improvements it has undertaken, however, this has not been recognised in the final grading. This then leaves us with the impression that it is not a true reflection of what the Service is providing to residents and concentrates on some of the support work of the Service rather than its central mission of saving lives". (Audit Commission website)
WSCC Audio release Chief Fire Officer Martin Burrell