Led by Chief of West Yorkshire Fire & Rescue service, John Roberts, who was joined by personnel from the UK, Jersey, the Isle of Man and Gibraltar, the group spent four days familiarising themselves with Guernsey’s fire service, with a focus on areas including fire prevention and protection, and operational response.
Interviews were also conducted with senior States politicians and civil servants, as well as each member of Fire & Rescue.
The full findings of the inspection are due to be published next month.
Guernsey chief fire officer Les Britzman said the last full external inspection of the island’s fire service was back in 2008, as Fire & Rescue did not fall under His Majesty’s Inspectorate in the UK.
‘This latest inspection will give us a benchmark of where we are against other services, with a view to driving improvement and creating a plan to modernise us and make us fit for the future,' he said.
‘We need to be transparent, we’re accountable to the public through the [Home Affairs] committee so it’s right and proper that we open ourselves up, and we are not scared of that.’
Mr Britzman said initial impressions from the inspection were positive, with Fire & Rescue ‘ahead of the game’ with its state-of-the-art decontamination unit used to cleanse firefighters’ uniform of contaminants from soot and smoke.
The service enjoyed an ‘excellent’ collaborative working relationship with the Police and Ambulance & Rescue, while fire staff were ‘hard-working, dedicated and professional’, and held a healthy attitude towards training, development, and improvement.
‘The standard of teamworking is absolutely incredible, it’s a real joy to see the team working as they do,’ he said.
As for areas of improvement, Mr Britzman said the nature of Fire & Rescue’s work meant his team was constantly learning from what was happening elsewhere.
One area the service struggled with was the capacity to review incidents and updates from the UK and other locations and adapt them to Guernsey.
‘We struggle with the capacity to deliver that. We also want to do a lot more to prevent fires in the community for our most vulnerable residents, and we want to do much more with our partners to proactively identify who those vulnerable people are.’
Having only been appointed as chief fire officer earlier this year, Mr Britzman said the inspection’s findings would be valuable in identifying Fire & Rescue’s strengths and weaknesses, and prioritising areas that needed most work.
‘We shouldn’t be afraid of opening ourselves up, and we shouldn’t be afraid of areas where we need to improve.
‘We do need to continue to invest in our staff and our equipment and keep that up to speed, and ensure we are a modern fire service which is safe and effective and does the best it possibly can for the people of Guernsey.’
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