HR Update - New fire fighter posts in West Yorkshire !!!!

 Well OK, we confess there has only been ONE. 

Was it a "coal face firefighter" at  £28k a year 

NOPE

Was it  middle ranking officer at about  £50k a year 

NOT THAT EITHER 

The only recruitment that has taken place is for an 

Assistant Chief Fire Officer 

at a whopping  £120k plus 

figures from  WYFRA HR Committee 12th April 2013 

Now call us old fashioned but surely IF the number of stations is reducing, staff numbers being cut and  things according to Simon Pilling are all looking good, (fires down, smoke alarms saving people from burning buildings etc) 

Why do you need to replace an ACO?   

We know Martyns gone off  to play trains, a hobby he has pursued since being a teenager,  but  surely the top table should take a large dose of its own medicine and embrace the concept of not filling vacant posts due to retirement.  

Don't forget we are due another ACO retirement later in the year Craig McIntosh retires (and is  probably due to spend more time with his bagpipes) and then  Steve Rhodes hops into his  empty post on  July 1st 2013. This was all decided way back in September 2012. 

Perhaps its time to consider a 

"fundamental review"  of  the top table. 

Actually the HR report for April 12th is a cracking good read, and we will be blogging more about it the coming few days.Staff Cuts, job re profiling , compromise agreements, redundancies, compulsory and otherwise make shameful reading especially when this has all be implemented by a Labour controlled authority. 

Mind you Politicians also line their nests with money from the public purse,  we asked way back in September if people knew how much fire authority councillors receive as an allowance. And many councillors receive more than one allowance  from varying sources.  Click here to see what we wrote way back in Sept 2012. The chair of the fire authorities income is a fascinating read, he must have at least 30 hours in every day to pack it all in, and thats not counting the FOI investigation  he has been involved with recently! 

We are currently researching how much some of the WYFRA members get from the public purse to carry out their various duties.   It's quite an interesting  topic,  while  many of their constituents lose benefits, and get clobbered by bedroom taxes etc  politicians don't seem to be suffering at all ..............and the more "posts" you do, the more money you get. 

But surely the more you do 

 - the less time you give to each! 

Will there be redundancies at the Top Table ?

On careful reading of the Executive Committee Meeting held on June 13th we have noticed the following paragraph. The full docs are available Here

Principle Command Team  - Succession Planning


The Committee considered a detailed report from the Chief Executive/ Chief Fire Officer setting out options for future succession planning and possible revisions of the principal officer uniformed service command structure which also affected the future structure of the management board. The Chief Executive / Chief Fire Officer expressed his preference for adoption of Option 1 (as detailed in the report) which would in due course potentially reduce the overall number of Principal Officers. It was noted that there would be a lengthy "trial period" which would enable a robust operating assessment to be made of the practical feasibility of the proposals which would also require approval from the full Authority in due course as such matters are "reserved matters".


SO IF YOU ARE SUPPOSED TO BE MAKING  REDUCTIONS _ WHY HAVE YOU JUST APPOINTED TWO NEW ACO'S ?  One to start 1st  January  (David Walton of WMFRS) and Steve Rhodes of WYFRS to take up  post in  July  2013.

We would also like to add that as with all WYFRA documents - none of the actual reports referred to are in the public domain.  So we  can only guess that Option 1 - was to keep the fat cats fed and continue to reduce the people who actually do the hard and dirty work of fire and rescue.