Cabinet paper: Fire and Rescue Service Governance Reform (Annex A)

1. Changes to FRA membership and budget setting arrangements will require amendment of FRA Combination Orders through secondary legislation under the Fire and Rescue Services Act 2004.  Other consequential legislative amendments will also need to be considered once full drafting instructions are provided to Legal Services. The amendments of the FRA Combination Orders are intended to be introduced in March to provide for implementation of membership changes in South Wales FRA in 2026 and in the other two FRAs in 2027 following the local government elections. 

2. An integrated impact assessment was undertaken alongside the development of proposals for consultation and is available here: Integrated Impact Assessment.

3. The current funding arrangements for FRAs involve them levying contributions on their constituent local authorities; they do not receive core funding from the Welsh Government.  Contribution rates are at each FRA’s discretion and neither we nor local authorities have any control over their decisions.  As noted in the main paper the Cabinet Secretary for Housing and Local Government plans to add a requirement for FRAs to formally and meaningfully consult with Local Authorities as part of their budget setting processes.

4. There are cost implications of £300,000 for the Welsh Government in respect of any enhancement to the FRA inspection programme for Wales.  That provision is to cover the cost of inspection support for the Crown appointed Chief Fire and Rescue Services Inspector for Wales, including the cost of commissioning ad hoc additional support for the inspection process from subject matter experts.  This cost has been included in the indicative allocation of £3.119m to the Fire and Rescue Services BEL 1265 (revenue) in the 2026-27 Draft Budget.

5. Other saving and costs rest with FRAs.  These include: 

• The Democracy and Boundary Commission Cymru (DBCC) sets the rates for FRA members who are both nominated, and who are appointed by Welsh Ministers via the public appointments process.  Local authority members in receipt of a Band 1 or Band 2 senior salary (which is Leader / Deputy Leader and Cabinet member) cannot currently receive a salary from any FRA to which they have been appointed, although remain eligible to claim travel and subsistence expenses and contribution towards costs of care and personal assistance from the NPA or FRA.
• We will raise our planned changes with the DBCC to enable them to review the current rates for FRAs in light of these.  Until then it is not possible to identify whether and how much member savings will materialise from the reduction in FRA member numbers.   
• There are potential additional administrative costs for FRAs associated with delivering and maintaining an enhanced member training and development programme and being subject to a broader inspection programme. There may also be costs associated with the implementation of improvements resulting from inspections.  These will need to be met by FRAs.

6. There are no particular governance issues arising from this paper.

7. This paper has been cleared by LGH&CCRA Operation Team (HLGP/25/108), Education, Culture and Welsh Language Operation Team (ECWL/JB/13/25) and by Budget and Government Business Division (BGB/2060/6). 

8. There are no statistics presented in this paper that require the clearance of Knowledge and Analytical Services.

9. There are no cross-portfolio issues associated with the proposal in this paper.