Peterborough's fire service responds after report says it must improve response to fires and emergencies

The report, published on Friday (June 12) by His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue Services (HMICFRS) rated the service in ten key areas.

The service was rated ‘Good’ in two areas, ‘Adequate’ in five and ‘Requires Improvement’ in three.

Among the area the service was told to improve was ‘Responding to fires and emergencies.’

The full breakdown

- Good: Understanding fire and risk, Public safety through fire regulation

- Adequate: Preventing fire and risk, Responding to major incidents, Best use of resources and future affordability, promoting values and culture, right people-right skills

- Requires Improvement: Responding to fires and emergencies, Ensuring fairness and diversity, Leading people effectively

In its overall findings, the report noted that: “The service has a sound understanding of future financial challenges and it has plans to mitigate its main financial risks. It makes savings consistently.”

It added: “Overall, there is a clear commitment from staff and senior leaders to improve. The foundations for an effective fire and rescue service exist. To build on these foundations, senior leaders must make sure oversight is stronger, governance is more consistent, and assurance across critical areas is improved.”

When it comes to its response to incidents, the report found there was a ‘clearly communicated response strategy’ and call-out time targets are consistently met, however, improvements in filling out risk assessments and the availability of on-call fire engines needed to improve.

The report stated: “The service has set out response standards and consistently meets these standards.

"It aims to have its first fire engine at the most serious incidents within an average of 9 minutes in urban areas and 12 minutes in rural areas. It also aims to get its first fire engine to all incidents within 18 minutes on 95 percent of occasions.

"In the year ending March 31 2025, it achieved the first fire engine attending in 7 minutes and 19 seconds in urban areas and 11 minutes and 21 seconds in rural areas. Almost all incidents (95.6 percent) in the service area were attended by the first fire engine within 18 minutes.

“Data shows that in the year ending June 30, 2025, the service’s average response time to primary fires was 10 minutes and 46 seconds. This is faster than the average for services that are predominantly rural.”

It did, however, state: “As part of our inspection, we interviewed incident commanders from across the service. Not all of them could explain how they completed risk assessments, made decisions or recorded information at incidents in line with national best practice.

"We found that risk assessments weren’t routinely completed during incidents. Several of the files we reviewed showed limited evidence that risk assessments had been carried out, including a major incident.”

The service has accepted the report’s findings and insisted the areas identified for improvement have also been identified internally although budget constraints do limit the force’s capacity to respond to these.

Chief Fire Officer Matthew Warren said: “We thank the inspectorate for their assessment of our service.

Reading the full report, they make many positive statements about our service, recognising what we do well in the services we provide, how we consistently meet our response standards, managing risk in the county, managing financial resources and helping to keep people safe in their homes and businesses.

“The report also comments positively about our culture in terms of the values and behaviours people demonstrate daily, how welcoming and engaging people were and how we deal with any misconduct. We have always been, and continue to be, proud of our culture and the inclusive working environment people experience.

“The majority of the areas highlighted for improvement are things we are already aware of and are working towards improving. We are a small fire and rescue service and we prioritise our areas of focus based on risk and resources, knowing we cannot do everything at once.

"Having an independent team come in and look at what we do, recognise what we do well and suggesting where they think we can improve, ensures we continue to deliver the best service we can to the communities we serve. I am confident our plans to improve the highlighted areas will see positive outcomes over the coming months.

“The positive work highlighted in the report is testament to the passion, hard work and commitment of everyone who works here to keep our communities safe and provide an effective, efficient and professional response when people need us.”

To view the report, visit https://hmicfrs.justiceinspectorates.gov.uk/.