My mistake, I took this figure as per month, my reason for this is, up until last year, we were expected to do 12 per tour, making 48 a month. This was on top of all of the jobs I listed. With regards to the work organisation and training being down to the CM's & WM's, I only agree to a certain extent, but not completely. They can only achieve all of their objectives if they have support from their SM's, GM's and principle officers. I don't just mean, the gaffers saying, "Yes , you are right, it needs to be done" What I mean is, not coming and dumping every hair brained scheme and new initiative on watches and expecting them to do it effectively whilst carrying out all of their station duties, fire calls, standard tests, home safety risk assessments, smoke alarm fitting (4 a day), assisting the probationer with his NVQ, on station training, etc. etc.
I believe that so many JO's are as afraid as their superiors to tell the people above them that they simply can't complete the work correctly and maintain standards of training and balance skill levels.
The fact that so many senior officers don't inform their line managers that some tasks are unrealistic if they are to be achieved correctly means that in the truest sense of the word, "Crap rolls downhill" . I for one stopped hitting targets for smoke alarm fitting a long time ago because I insisted that the job was done correctly including giving sound home safety advice where it was needed. I also ensured that my crew were giving all the training that was required in order to maintain competency levels. I was hauled in to the office on several occasions by the station manager telling me to "Just get it done, the targets must be met". I remained calm on every occasion and asked him if he wished me to not do my job correctly in order to make these targets, each time , he accused me of being insubordinate.
I am in no way shape or form, some raving militant unionist, but I do feel that it is time that targets for other work were put secondary to maintaining operational readiness. It is clear to most of the firefighters that have served 10 years or more that standards are very often not being maintained to a suitable level. The scary thing is that in a few years time, the firefighters that are developing now with insufficient knowledge and skills are going to be the mentors and JO's in charge of new trainees and probationers. When skills and knowledge are no longer there, it's gone for good. The loss of the fire service promotion exams means that there are so many people being promoted without proper knowledge of vital information for junior officers. We will all be fantastic at running airport terminals and sports complexes but no bloody good at commanding stressful and dangerous operational incidents where underpinning knowledge can often save lives by creating a more efficiently run and safe incident ground.
I am a firm believer that we should carry out community safety work, I embrace putting up smoke detectors and I value the aims and objectives of my brigade, but let's all remember that when the bells, whistles, pips and sirens go, we are driving to the unknown and our skill levels better be good enough or someone could very easily get seriously hurt or killed. I for one am not prepared to put the safety of myself, my crew or the public I serve at risk, so that some manager gets a star next to his name for hitting targets.
Sorry for going on a bit but the soap box was very stable and I didn't want to get off.
Kaiser, a maths lesson maybe? 78 x 4 x 112 = 34944 (nearest whole number was used to get 78), 78 is per ANNUM!!. So that is 6.5 per MONTH, maybe 3 HFRAs, plenty of time to do them properly!
Your last sentence hits the mark, though. That is a really important point, though I stress that it starts with CMs.
