Dear Brother/Sister
You will recall that in 2002/3, the FBU signed what became known as €œThe Gold Command Agreement€. For the same reasons as then, discussions have been taking place between the FBU, the national employers and FRS/Government representatives in England, Scotland and Wales on similar agreements, regarding any periods of strike action that take place in relation to the fire service pension dispute.
In the light of the alterations in respect of responsibilities for fire and rescue services that have taken place since 2002/3, the FBU is a signatory to three such agreements; one for each of Wales, Scotland and England. They are all identical on the substantive issues. The agreements are appendices to NJC Circular NJC/09/13 which is attached.
As with the 2002/3 agreement, there will need to be local discussions for local implementation, and advice has been provided to officials in respect of those local discussions with individual fire and rescue services.
The key elements within the agreements are:
- It is entirely voluntary for any individual to attend such incidents.
- The agreement only applies in respect of a major incident.
- The agreement recognises that firefighters need access to their appliances and equipment and PPE, and therefore access to the stations and other workplaces. There is no point fire and rescue services wanting these arrangements, but denying access to the fire stations.
- The FBU has not made an agreement for local contingency arrangements for incidents other than major incidents.
- Implementation of these agreements does not require new/temporary €œcontracts€ or written agreements of any kind between members and the FRS, and any such requests or demands from FRSs should be declined.
Members will remember that in the 2002/3 dispute, there was a great deal of mistrust amongst members that fire and rescue services would abuse the agreement and mobilise crews to calls which were not major incidents. Then, as now, it was generally acknowledged that abuse of the agreement would be likely to result in members not being willing to turn out on subsequent occasions as a consequence of the abuse of their trust.
In making these agreements, we are mindful that in the 2002/3 dispute, no such mobilisations were necessary. Equally, we are mindful that firefighters who are €œbanned€ from their stations are unlikely to volunteer in the event of an incident, not least because of the impracticality of doing so.
If you have any queries could I ask that you ask them of your brigade officials.
Please bear in mind that:
- No strike action has been called at this time.
- Local officials have been sent the information at the same time as you, and may not have had as early an opportunity as you to read and digest the information.
- Local officials will not yet have had the opportunity to discuss this with FRS management.
- Negotiations with management will not be rushed but will need to be done quite quickly.
Best wishes.
Yours fraternally
Andy Dark
Assistant General Secretary
2013HOC0502AD
