NORTH WALES FIRE AND RESCUE AUTHORITY

Minutes of the meeting of North Wales Fire and Rescue Authority held on Monday 16 December 2019 at Conwy County Borough Council Chamber, Bodlondeb, Conwy. Meeting commenced at 10.30am.

PRESENT

Councillor 
P Lewis (Chair) Conwy County Borough Council
B Apsley Wrexham County Borough Council
M Bateman Flintshire County Council
A Davies Denbighshire County Council
M Ll Davies Denbighshire County Council
M Dixon Wrexham County Borough Council
V Gay Flintshire County Council
R Griffiths Anglesey County Council
J B Hughes Gwynedd Council
S Lloyd-Williams Conwy County Borough Council
G Lowe Wrexham County Borough Council
R E Parry Conwy County Borough Council
B Parry-Jones Wrexham County Borough Council
D Rees Anglesey County Council
G A Roberts Gwynedd Council
R Roberts Wrexham County Borough Council
N Smith Conwy County Borough Council
W O Thomas Flintshire County Council
G G Williams Gwynedd Council

Also present:

S A Smith (Chief Fire Officer and Chief Executive); C Everett (Clerk and Monitoring Officer to the Authority); K W Finch (Treasurer to the Authority); R Fairhead and K Roberts (Assistant Chief Fire Officers); S Morris and H MacArthur (Assistant Chief Officers); T Williams (Corporate Communications Manager); A Davies (Member Liaison Officer).

APOLOGIES

Councillor 
B Blakeley Denbighshire County Council
A I Dunbar Flintshire County Council
P Evans Denbighshire County Council
S Glyn Gwynedd Council
E W Jones Anglesey County Council
P Shotton Flintshire County Council
A Tansley Conwy County Borough Council
 
1 DECLARATIONS OF INTEREST

1.1 There were no declarations of interest.

2 MINUTES OF THE MEETING HELD ON 16 SEPTEMBER 2019

2.1 The minutes of the Fire and Rescue Authority meeting held on 16 September were submitted for approval.

2.2 RESOLVED to approve minutes of the meeting as a true and correct record.

3 MATTERS ARISING

3.1 There were no matters arising.

4 URGENT MATTERS

4.1 There were no urgent matters.

5 CHAIR’S REPORT

5.1 The report provided information on the meetings and events attended by the Chair and Deputy Chair of the Authority in their official capacities between December 2018 and December 2019.

5.2 RESOLVED to note the information provided.

6 PROVISIONAL OUTTURN 2019/20

6.1 The report was presented to inform Members about the projected revenue and capital expenditure position, as at 30 November 2019.

6.2 Members were reminded that the Authority had approved a revenue budget of £35.2m at its meeting on 17 December 2018 and a budget realignment was approved at the meeting in September 2019. It was noted that the forecast outturn position remains that the Authority will achieve a breakeven against this budget.

6.3 Also at the 17 December 2018 meeting, the Authority approved a capital budget of £3.1m; this was later reviewed and revised to £2.1m. However, since the programme was revised, projects have slipped in relation to Facilities due to works having to be re-tendered, and also ICT/Control which is largely due to the delay in the joint project with North Wales Police for the secondary control relocation. It was noted that it is anticipated that funding will be rolled over to 2020/21 to accommodate this slippage.

6.4 RESOLVED to note the draft revenue and capital outturn positions as at 30 November 2019.

7 MEDIUM TERM FINANCIAL STRATEGY 2020/23 AND BUDGET 2020/21

7.1 The report was presented to inform Members about the Medium Term Financial Strategy 2020/23 and the draft revenue and capital budgets for 2020/21.

7.2 Members were reminded that the Authority is required to set a balanced budget in December each year. The report outlined the key assumptions, risks and uncertainties identified during the budget planning process.

7.3 The Treasurer informed Members that since the report had been distributed to Members, information had been received on Friday 13 December 2019 that the basis for allocating the contributions from local authorities for 2020/21 had changed following the recommendations in a report from the Distribution Sub Group (a working group of the Finance Sub Group) which makes recommendations to Welsh Government as to the basis of funding distribution. The basis will change to ‘2018 mid-year population’ as the group concluded that this offers the most relevant estimate of the population and it was agreed to continue to make an adjustment to the figures for HMP Berwyn in Wrexham in recognition of the prisoner population and the impact on services. The change will be phased in over a two year period to ensure the impact on individual authorities is minimal. The contributions from the six constituent authorities have been re-calculated using the new basis and a revised table can be seen below:

* 2020/2021 projected contributions from local authorities based on draft budget and must be considered in conjunction with risk and uncertainties outlined in the report.

7.4 Having sought clarification about some aspects of the report, it was RESOLVED to

(i) approve the capital and revenue budgets for 2020/21 based on an increase in contributions from constituent local authorities as noted in the table in paragraph 7.3;
(ii) note the key risks and uncertainties identified during the budget planning process; and
(iii) endorse the Medium Term Financial Strategy.

8 IMPROVEMENT AND WELL-BEING PLAN 2020/21

8.1 The report was presented to inform Members about the progress of the Authority’s public consultation and to propose revising the improvement and well-being objectives as part of the process of drafting its next Improvement and Well-being Plan.

8.2 ACO Morris reminded Members that the Fire and Rescue Authority is required to publish improvement and well-being objectives and to have involved the public and other stakeholders in the process of developing those objectives. It was noted that the Authority’s public consultation is ongoing and will close on 17 January 2020. It was also noted that officers have attended scrutiny committee meetings within local authorities to discuss the consultation with councillors.

8.3 Following feedback from the Well-being of Future Generations Commissioner it was proposed that the Authority take the opportunity to revise and expand its long-term objectives for 2020/21 onwards; these will be presented to the Authority at its March meeting.

8.4 Cllr Lloyd-Williams expressed concern about the Commissioner’s comments and asked whether it was possible to seek further clarification in order to be able to focus on exactly what is expected of the Authority. The Chair confirmed that at the last Executive Panel meeting, Members had raised the same issues and it was noted that this will be discussed in more detail at the next Executive Panel meeting in February.

8.5 RESOLVED to

i) note the progress of the Authority’s ongoing public consultation seeking views on the development and adoption of an environmental strategy; and
ii) approve the proposal that officers draft an expanded set of improvement and well-being objectives for consideration initially by the Executive Panel and subsequently by the full Authority at its next meeting in March 2020.

9 MEMBERSHIP OF THE AUTHORITY’S PLANNING WORKING GROUP TO DEVELOP THE FIRE AND RESCUE AUTHORITY’S PLAN FOR 2021/22

9.1 ACO Morris presented the report asking Members to agree the membership of the Authority’s Planning Working Group 2020.

9.2 It was noted that the Authority’s planning processes will need to commence early in 2020 to allow enough time for the Authority to draft, consult on and approve its 2021/22 plan for publication in
early 2021.

9.3 RESOLVED to

(i) agree that the full membership of the Authority’s Executive Panel becomes the membership of the Planning Working Group;
(ii) agree to continue to include the Chair and Deputy Chair of the Audit Committee on the Planning Working Group; and
(iii) note the dates of meetings, to be held at Headquarters, as follows:
20 January, 2pm
2 March, 2pm
30 March, 10am.

10 MEETING DATES 2020/21

10.1 The Clerk presented the report which informed Members of the dates for meetings of the full Fire and Rescue Authority, Executive Panel and Audit Committee for 2020/21. They are as follows:

10.2 Dates for the NWFRA meetings are scheduled as follows:

Monday 16 March 2020
Monday 15 June 2020
Monday 21 September 2020
Monday 21 December 2020
Monday 15 March 2021

10.3 Dates for the Executive Panel meetings, to be held at Fire and Rescue Service Headquarters St Asaph (normally at 10.00am), are scheduled as follows:

Monday 10 February 2020
Monday 18 May 2020
Monday 27 July 2020, 2pm
Monday 19 October 2020
Monday 15 February 2021

10.4 Dates for the Audit Committee meetings, to be held at Fire and Rescue Service Headquarters St Asaph at 10.00am, are scheduled as follows:

Monday 27 January 2020
Monday 27 July 2020
Monday 21 September 2020, 9.30am, Bodlondeb
Monday 25 January 2021

10.5 RESOLVED to note the dates for meetings of the Fire and Rescue Authority, Executive Panel and Audit Committee set for 2020/21.

11 WG PLANS FOR REFORM OF GOVERNANCE OF FRAs IN WALES

11.1 The Chair gave Members an update following the last Chiefs and Chairs meeting with the Deputy Minister. Issues discussed included:

• firefighter pay and expanding the role;
• firefighter pensions - if funding is made available for pensions this will be paid via a direct grant from the WG;
• Grenfell – all Chief Fire Officers had given an update about work undertaken in their own Services following the Grenfell report.

11.2 In relation to the reform of governance of FRAs in Wales, it was noted that there had been no further developments, apart from the Deputy Minister confirming that she is no longer considering the option of having cabinet members representing the fire and rescue authorities.

11.3 Following the Chief Fire Officer’s comments about the Local Government and Elections (Wales) Bill introduced on
18 November 2019, which includes proposals to remove the requirement for the Secretary of State to hold a public inquiry for significant changes such as station closures, Members expressed grave concern that such proposals and changes would remove decisions from a particular level of democracy. Members will be kept fully informed of any developments with regards to the Bill.

11.4 RESOLVED to note the information provided.

12 PUBLIC SERVICES BOARDS – UPDATE

12.1 ACO Morris presented the report which summarised the progress that each of the four North Wales Public Services Boards (PSBs) has made towards meeting the well-being objectives set in their well-being plans that were published in April/May 2018.

12.2 It was noted that the four North Wales PSBs have published their first annual reports demonstrating progress against well-being plans for their areas and a link to each annual report was included in the report. The PSBs continue to meet regularly and to work through subject sub-groups. Whilst the well-being plans themselves identified 74 priorities for North Wales, the four PSBs rationalised the number of priorities to focus on within their areas.

12.3 RESOLVED to note the progress that has been made by the four PSBs in North Wales towards achieving their well-being objectives, as outlined in their annual reports.

13 BIODIVERSITY AND THE ENVIRONMENT WALES ACT 2016

13.1 ACO MacArthur presented the report which addressed North Wales Fire and Rescue Authority’s compliance with section 6 of the Environment (Wales) Act 2016. It also provided information on proposed future planning and reporting of actions by the Authority in relation to improving biodiversity within its estate.

13.2 It was noted that the Authority is required to plan for, and report on its actions to improve, biodiversity within its estate. Attached to the report was a draft Biodiversity and Resilience of Ecosystems Report 2019 for approval to publish on the Authority’s website by the end of December in accordance with section 6 of the Environment (Wales) Act 2016.

13.3 RESOLVED to approve the content of the Biodiversity and Resilience of Ecosystems Report 2019 to be incorporated into an illustrated publication on the Authority’s website before the end of December 2019.

14 MEMBERS’ REGISTER OF INTERESTS AND RELATED PARTY TRANSACTIONS

14.1 The Clerk reminded Members of the importance of ensuring their register of interests was kept up to date. It was noted that all Members’ register of interests are published on the NWFRA website. The annual related party transactions form will be distributed early in the New Year and again Members were asked to complete and return promptly in order for the information to be included in the annual accounts required by the Wales Audit Office.

14.2 RESOLVED to note the information.