The London Fire Brigade has won three awards in the government’s Fire and Rescue Service Equality and Diversity Awards.
The awards, held for the first time this year, were presented at the Fire 2007 Conference by Fire Minister Angela Smith. They have been set up to give recognition to fire and rescue service staff in England, both individually and in teams, who have shown exceptional commitment to improving diversity in the service.
Speaking at the conference, Angela Smith said: “The Fire and Rescue Service does a fantastic job of protecting and serving the public, but its staff must also reflect the public that it serves. There has been progress in making the Fire and Rescue Service more diverse - we must not be complacent. The government is committed to helping to create a more locally representative Fire and Rescue Service workforce. Only by reflecting the local community that it serves can the Fire Service fully understand local needs. I congratulate all of the winners.”
The Brigade’s three winners are the Career Developing Mentoring Team, who won the Leadership Team Award for a fast track development programme that resulted in a significant increase in the representation of women and minority ethnic staff at managerial level.
Head of Equalities Patricia Oakley was also commended in the leadership team category for a project which supports firefighters who have dyslexia. And Watch Manager Steve White from Poplar Fire Station received a commendation for demonstrating excellent leadership and personal commitment to increase his team’s understanding of different faiths and cultures to help them work more effectively in the local community.
Councillor Liaquat Ali, Chair of the Human Resources, Equalities and Health and Safety Panel at London Fire and Emergency Planning Authority, said: “Winning these awards shows that all the hard work our staff are doing to create a more diverse workforce which truly reflects the communities we serve is paying dividends. I congratulate the winners of the awards and also all our staff who work ‘behind the scenes’ who are committed to building a better Brigade to make sure we achieve our vision of making London a safer city.”
Note to editors:
1. A panel of judges drawn from the wider equality and diversity community of the public and private sectors was convened to consider the nominations.
The judges looked for evidence of:
- an innovative approach
- ambitious and appropriate objectives
- sound planning
- good practice that other fire and rescue services would benefit from
- successful delivery
- effective monitoring
- how the work had had a positive effect on progressing the equality and diversity aims of the fire and rescue service.
2. The awards were given by Fire Minister Angela Smith at the Fire 2007 conference at the NEC in Birmingham on Thursday 24 May 2007.
Members of the media can obtain further information from the press office on:
telephone number: 020 8536 5922
email: press@london-fire.gov.uk
