Fire and Rescue Sector

Fire and Rescue Services in the UK play a vital role in public safety, protecting lives and property from fire and the effects of fire. The sector is divided into four occupational groupings:

  • Local Authority Fire and Rescue Services (approximately 46,000 employees)
  • Civil Airport Fire Services (approximately 4,000 employees)
  • Ministry of Defence Fire Services (approximately 3,000 employees)
  • Occupational brigades provided by and to protect private companies, such as those in the nuclear and petroleum industries (approximately 300 brigades)
  • The National Occupational Standards and NVQs/SVQs are appropriate for all of these.

There are currently 58 local authority services throughout the UK. Under the provisions of the Fire Services Act (1947) and later legislation and amendments, the local authority brigades have a duty to provide the following services:

  • Community Fire Safety: this covers a range of initiatives that are aimed at reducing the number of fires and the number of deaths and injuries caused by fire.
  • Fire and Rescue Emergency Response: this is a service that responds to incidents and makes sure that the risk of injury, loss of life and damage to property is minimised.
  • Emergency Planning - services that plan and prepare for large-scale emergencies, for example, large rail crashes, coastal pollution, and severe floods.

In addition most services provide special services: services that respond to other types of incident, for example, vehicle accidents, trapped people and animals, storms and floods.
 
NOS are available for all the key functions in the Fire and Rescue Sector and apply to all the occupational groupings above.
 
The responsibility for the Fire and Rescue Sector standards, qualifications and apprenticeships moved from SkillsPlus UK to Skills for Justice on April 1st 2009.

For further information please visit the Skills for Justice website

Current versions of the Fire and Rescue Sector National Occupational Standards can be viewed at the UK Commission’s NOS Directory at www.ukces.org.uk

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Local government NOS