Fire Services: West Midlands

Mr. Jim Cunningham
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government what steps the Government have taken to improve fire services in the West Midlands.

Mr. Dhanda
Fire and rescue authorities are responsible for their own improvement. The Government set out performance expectations in the Fire and Rescue National Framework. The Audit Commission regularly assesses the performance of all fire and rescue authorities, and identifies areas of strengths and areas for improvement which fire and rescue authorities are expected to address. The Government fund the Audit Commission for conducting this work. In 2005, the Audit Commission assessed West Midlands fire and rescue authority as “good” in the comprehensive performance assessment for the fire and rescue service. Since then, the West Midlands has been judged as “improving well” by the Audit Commission in their 2006-07 performance assessment work and as “performing well” in their use of resources and delivery of value for money and in their front-line service delivery.

In addition to their performance assessment work, the Audit Commission has a local “relationship manager” for each fire and rescue authority who can provide ongoing advice to authorities on improvement issues. Fire and rescue authorities also have access to the joint Department for Communities and Local Government and Local Government Association capacity building programme through their Regional Improvement and Efficiency Partnership.