Known as the largest Fire Brigade in the United Kingdom, the London Fire Brigade has earned a very colourful history all throughout the years. Established in order to make London a safer city, the London Brigade’s vision is to be a world class fire and rescue service for London, Londoners and visitors.
The United Kingdom is one of the largest, strongest and most diverse territories in the world. With a country that is this huge, the challenge for the London Fire Brigade to help the community become better and safer isn’t easy. Because of this, the renowned brigade has created a system where everything is organised from the approximate 7,000 staff of which 5,800 are operational fire-fighters and officers down to their designated trainings and tasks.
As every fire brigade should have, the London Fire Brigade is made up of four directorates where each has a chairperson that is involved in handling and commanding the major tasks. Each of the firemen inside the London Fire Brigade is respectively assigned on these directorates based on the skills and specialisations they have when applying for the job.
The Corporate Management Team is the highest of the four directorates where the head is in charge of providing overall co-ordination and promotion of the highest standards of management and operational practice throughout the organisation. Next in line is the Deputy Commissioner’s Directorate which is responsible for planning, direction and delivery of all aspects of operational service delivery including mobilising, community and regulatory fire safety.
The first two directorates basically cover the operational system of the fire brigade. This is where fire fighters are assigned in order to be trained and called upon in times of fire and emergencies. Fire fighters in the London Fire Brigade are extensively trained and are meticulously recruited in order to ensure the public that in times of fire and accidents, the fire fighters can deliver the job with stellar performance.
Aside from the operational system, a fire brigade must also have someone to take care of the finances, funds and paperwork as well as the logistics and maintenance. The third committee handles the Finance and Contractual Services. Here, the statutory financial control, accountancy and treasury services, budget, payroll and audit systems are handled. Among the four councils of the London Fire Brigade, member involved in this group aren’t usually assigned in fire fighting. However, they are still trained for primary precautionary measures for times of grave need.
Last but not the least, the last among the four directorates is comprised of Operational Resilience and Training. This is basically London’s fire brigades HR service and logistics combined into one. The committee is responsible for the recruitment of new fire fighters and assessing the all of the employees’ performance in the brigade as well. The Directorate of Operational Resilience also handles the regular counselling, health check and training of the fire-fighters. They also cover the monitoring of equipment and inventories.
Having these four major committees inside London Fire Brigade doesn’t even end their tasks from helping the community. Each of the committees have specific plans and outputs where they contribute to the community constantly. It doesn’t mean that fire brigades only work when there is a fire. Most of the time, fire fighters conduct seminars and talks with communities in order to build awareness. Other than that, the London Fire Brigade has been helping various public organisations in keeping London safer day by day.
