Proposal to merge East Sussex fire control room with West Sussex and Surrey

The top choice for how firefighters with East Sussex's Fire and Rescue Service should be controlled and dispatched is to share a single control room in Surrey alongside crews from that county and West Sussex. That's according to a report before East Sussex's Fire Authority on Friday (October, 25), as consultants look back over an, essentially, failed five-year project to merge with West Sussex's control centre. The merger never took place and, according to the consultants' report, East Sussex's control moved to the new centre at Haywards Heath over three years behind schedule. The report recommends outsourcing to Surrey Fire and Rescue Service, a control centre which is currently in the process of merging with West Sussex. Options Five options have been considered, and are expected to be presented to East Sussex Fire Authority members along with a recommendation: Outsource control and dispatch (mobilising) to North West Fire Control Ltd. (NWFC) in Cheshire; The recommendation: outsource control and mobilising to Surrey Fire and Rescue Service (SFRS) in their own control centre; Co-locate a control room, run by NWFC, with Sussex Police, and additionally use NWFC's facility in Cheshire as a back-up; Co-locate a control room, run by SFRS, with Sussex police, and additionally use SRFS's facility in Surrey as a back-up; Continue with East Sussex's stand-alone control room using the existing technology (whose deployment was delayed by over three years, and which West Sussex's Fire and Rescue Service rejected in favour of a new arrangement with SRFS). Consultants Mott MacDonald conducted a year-long process to discover and analyse the five options. Advantages In favour of the preferred option, consultants describe its benefits as including: Borderless mobilising for two adjacent counties in addition to East Sussex; Bringing standardisation between three services, helping to create more efficient asset mobilisation; Assisting all three fire and rescue services to offer the same type of service to groups throughout the three counties in case of civil emergencies e.g. natural disasters and other widespread and serious incidents; Allowing the old control centre in Haywards Heath to be used as a dedicated incident centre; Sharing information and resources between the three services; Bringing fire appliances to incidents from their closest location which may sometimes be across a county border. The report before East Sussex Fire Authority states that the cost of this option, including a risk contingency, will be £11.107m over seven years. Staff The senior leadership team in East Sussex Fire and Rescue Service addressed the issue of staff changes directly in their report to the Fire Authority. They stated: "SLT are very mindful of the long journey that our Control Room Staff have been on and also recognise that they will find further change extremely unsettling. "We have committed to working to provide support and redeployment opportunities for our staff, many who have given long and professional service to East Sussex and, after the Fire Authority final decision, we will begin work in earnest with both the representative bodies and all staff directly affected to explore their future options, not forgetting that the recommended option will afford TUPE (Transfer of Undertakings—Protection of Employment) protection to some. "We will also explore alternative options for those may wish to explore alternative roles within ESFRS, indeed some are already actively exploring those options." Warnings Consultants also warned that it's still necessary to consider any time or cost risks associated with the recommended option. They added these should be checked alongside the operational, industrial relations and people impacts of the alternative options. The report states a likely start date for the combined control centre of March 2021.