Amid talk of how employers and government might react to industrial action in the fire and rescue service, Thompsons Solicitors set out the legal position.
Fire and rescue services (FRSs) have a legal obligation to provide cover Under the Fire and Rescue Services Act 2004. The Civil Contingencies Act 2004, (CCA 2004) classes fire and rescue authorities as “category 1 responders”.
As such, an FRS is required to “maintain plans for the purpose of ensuring, so far as is reasonably practicable, that if an emergency occurs the [FRS] is able to continue to perform ... its functions.”
An emergency is defined as “an event or situation which threatens serious damage to human welfare. That may include industrial action in the fire and rescue service (FRS).
The duty the FRS has is to develop “business continuity management arrangements” and to identify any gap in the event of an emergency between its existing capability and the requirement for it to continue to perform its functions.
The CCA 2004 does not require a category 1 responder to deliver its functions at “ordinary levels” in an emergency. In practice, to satisfy the duty upon it, an FRS will try to coordinate its arrangements with other category 1 responders such as the police.
The national framework says that the FRS should plan to manage disruption without the support of the military.
