Communities and Local Government

Best Value has been applied to local authority services since 1 April 2000. There are a number of different categories of Fire & Rescue Authorities (FRAs) in England and Wales. Essentially these divide into 34 single-purpose authorities (London and the metropolitan FRAs and combined FRAs) and 16 county FRAs where the service is provided by the county council as one of a range of services. Single-purpose FRAs are Best Value authorities in their own right. For county FRAs the duty of Best Value applies at county council level.

The fire and rescue service BVPIs are described in the document 'Best Value Performance Indicators 2003/2004' which was published in January 2003. This document can be accessed on this website, via a link further down this page (under 'See also').

They were developed in consultation with fire and rescue service interests and replaced the indicators published by the Audit Commission up to and including 2002-2003. There are two broad categories of indicators, service delivery and corporate health. Service delivery indicators tend to show how effectively FRAs are providing services, for example in relation to the incidence of fires and fire-related casualties. Corporate health indicators provide information on how well FRAs are running themselves.

The BVPI data for service delivery indicators give a direct Fire & Rescue Service (F&RS) by F&RS comparison under each heading. A relatively small number of corporate health indicators have been applied to single-purpose fire authorities, reflecting their limited range of functions. The tables for some of the corporate health indicators may not cover all FRAs. Where it is considered important to have comparisons in the performance of all FRAs against particular corporate health indicators, such as sick leave rates, data have been collected from all authorities.

The indicators serve to highlight variations in performance. Under the Best Value process, FRAs will be required to compare their performance with that of the best and set targets for improvement. For the purpose of inter-F&RS comparisons, the data are also presented separately under a number of family groups for F&RS with similar characteristics.

For service delivery indicators much of the data used has been taken from information already collected from FRAs for the purposes of the publication of national fire statistics. For corporate health indicators the general approach adopted is that the indicators are applied to single-purpose FRAs where they are relevant.

The essence of Best Value is seeking continuous improvement in service delivery and outcomes. It is therefore vital that authorities are able to establish a comprehensive baseline of performance against which they and the people they serve can judge the progress they are making.

BVPI Family Groups

Each of the BVPI Indicator tables is mirrored by a set of tables in which the F&RSs are separated into 5 'family groups' to help them prepare best value performance plans.

Decimal places

Generally, indicators are shown to one decimal place. However, for the purposes of sorting the tables, a limit has not been put on the number of places.

Family groups

In April 2000, F&RSs were informed that their performance for the purposes of BVPIs 144 and 150 would be considered within 5 'family groups'. However, groupings for all the indicators will be found in this publication to assist in the best value process.

Sources of data

The Tables have been annotated with the data sources. These are clarified below:

• ODPM annual returns - All F&RSs submitted annual returns for 2003/04. The figures in the tables were taken from these returns, after having been checked and amended where appropriate.
• ODPM Best Value Survey - The figures used for BV3 came from the Best Value user satisfaction survey. Data for this survey is collected by the Local and Regional Government Research Unit (LRGRU) on a triennial basis.
• ODPM fire statistics - The figures used came from forms FDR 1 and 3 completed by F&RSs.
• CIPFA - The figures for the number of domestic properties (BVPI 142) and non-domestic properties (BVPI 149) were obtained from the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy.
• Registrar General's mid year estimates - Population figures were provided by the Office for National Statistics.
• RO6 returns to ODPM - BVPI 150 was calculated using information from Revenue Outturn Form 6 line 200.

Information on the make up of the BVPIs is contained in:

• Fire Service Circular 6/2000
• ODPM publication Best Value Performance Indicators 2003/2004.