Operational
Lincolnshire FRA has carried out its functions in accordance with the defined statutory and policy framework in which it is required to operate. The key documents setting this out are:
- The Fire and Rescue Services Act 2004
- The Civil Contingencies Act 2004
- The Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005
- Fire Safety Act 2021
- Fire Safety (England) Regulations
- Building Safety Act 2022
- The Fire and Rescue Services (Emergencies) (England) Order 2007
- The Localism Act 2011
- The Fire and Rescue National Framework for England
- The Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974
- Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions) Order 1975
- Serous Violence Duty
- The Care Act 2014
- Equality Duty 2010
- Policing and Crime Act 2017
Planning
2025 to 2026 was the second year of the four-year community risk management plan (CRMP). The CRMP:
- outlines how the service identify, assess and manage risk across Lincolnshire
- ensures that resources are aligned to the risks faced by communities locally
- keeps service delivery effective, proportionate and evidence based
The CRMP is reviewed annually. This ensures it stays current and responsive to new challenges and community needs.
The CRMP captures the services strategic intent in the medium term (four-year period) and covers four sections:
- safer communities
- service delivery
- value for money
- people
The four sections are translated into the annual service plan, setting out the specific actions, milestones and performance measures required during the year and providing the mechanism through which progress is monitored and evaluated.
During 2025 to 2026, the service continued to strengthen its performance management using:
- enhanced data analytics
- Power BI performance dashboards
- a robust governance framework
Progress against strategic priorities, service plans and key performance indicators was monitored through quarterly performance management board meetings, providing oversight at the highest level of the organisation. This process ensures that performance, productivity and organisational improvement remain central to service delivery. It also supports informed decision-making based on evidence and risk.
The annual review process also enables the service to:
- assess progress against strategic objectives
- identify emerging opportunities and challenges
- refine priorities where necessary
This approach supports a culture of continuous improvement, organisational learning and accountability, ensuring that LFR remains focused on delivering positive outcomes for the communities it serves whilst maintaining operational effectiveness and value for money.
Community risk management
LFR adopts a structured, evidence-based approach to community risk management. This ensures that resources are aligned to identified risks and targeted where they can have the greatest impact on:
- reducing harm
- protecting communities
- improving public safety
The approach to community risk management is supported by a variety of modelling processes. It combines:
- operational data
- demographic information
- partner intelligence
- emerging risk information
To develop a comprehensive understanding of current and future risks facing the county.
This process allows the service to:
- identify community risks such as:
- residential fires
- road traffic collisions
- flooding
- severe weather events
- rural and agricultural risks
- emerging technologies
- risks associated with vulnerable individuals and communities
- prioritise prevention, protection, emergency response and resilience activities ensuring resources are directed towards areas to deliver the greatest benefit
- deliver targeted interventions to reduce risk, improve community safety and support vulnerable individuals through:
- education
- engagement
- home fire safety visits
- business fire safety activity
- partnership working
- support effective emergency planning and community resilience arrangements through collaboration with:
- local authorities
- emergency services
- health partners
- voluntary organisations
- the Lincolnshire Resilience Forum
The service continually reviews its risk modelling to ensure they reflect emerging risks, changing community demographics and learning identified through a range of sources. This enables LFR to maintain an agile and responsive approach to risk management, ensuring service delivery remains:
- proportionate
- effective
- aligned to the priorities within the community risk management plan 2024 to 2028
This intelligence-led approach provides assurance that prevention, protection, response and resilience activities are directed towards the areas of greatest risk and community need. It supports compliance with the national framework expectation that fire and rescue authorities identify, assess and mitigate foreseeable fire and rescue-related risks through evidence-based decision making.
Risk identification and management
LFR use an intelligence-led approach to identifying, assessing and managing risk across the county.
We use a combination of:
- data analysis
- operational learning
- professional judgement
- partnership intelligence
This ensures resources are targeted effectively and risks are mitigated wherever possible.
The service continually reviews a wide range of information sources, including:
- incident data
- demographic trends
- community vulnerability data
- environmental factors
- emerging risk information
This allows us to develop a detailed understanding of the risks faced by communities, businesses and the wider county and informs strategic planning, operational preparedness and the targeting of prevention and protection activities.
Key elements of this approach include:
- using incident data, performance information, demographic analysis and sophisticated risk modelling techniques to identify high-risk individuals, communities, premises and geographical locations
- collaborative working with partner organisations to share information, develop joint risk profiles and coordinate interventions that reduce risk and improve community outcomes, including:
- Lincolnshire Police
- health partners
- local authorities
- housing providers
- voluntary sector organisations
- ongoing review of operational response arrangements to ensure that fire stations, personnel, specialist capabilities and operational assets remain aligned to identified risks and emerging threats across Lincolnshire
- delivery of a risk-based protection programme that targets business premises and other relevant buildings through fire safety audits, inspections, engagement activities and enforcement action where appropriate, supporting compliance with fire safety legislation and reducing the likelihood and impact of fire-related incidents.
- consideration of emerging risks and changes within the built and natural environment, including battery energy storage systems (BESS), electric vehicles, climate-related risks, flooding and changing community demographics, ensuring the service remains prepared for future challenges
This intelligence-led methodology supports evidence-based decision making across all areas of service delivery and ensures that LFR continues to deliver prevention, protection, response and resilience activities in a way that is proportionate, effective and focused on achieving the greatest benefit for the communities it serves.
Resilience and business continuity
Maintaining robust business continuity (BC) plans is essential. The service has continued to review, develop, exercise and strengthen its BC arrangements to ensure resilience against a wide range of foreseeable risks and operational challenges.
BC planning incorporates a range of potential disruptions, including:
- staff shortages
- loss of premises
- technology and communication failure
- loss of information
- fuel shortages
- disruption to supply chains
- loss of a key supplier or partner
During 2025 to 2026, the service also reviewed BC plans in response to the national threat level to ensure plans were aligned with the current counter terrorism advice and national resilience requirements.
Regular exercises of BC plans, and taking part in national and local exercises, enables the service to validate plans, assess preparedness and ensure arrangements remain current, proportionate and capable of supporting critical service delivery during disruptive events.
All exercises and BC events are debriefed to ensure areas of good practice and areas for improvement are identified.
LFR has expanded its focus beyond organisational continuity and supported the development of community resilience across the county. The service has developed community resilience plans for communities across Lincolnshire, working closely with:
- parish councils
- local authorities
- community groups
- partner agencies
This work adopts a strengths-based approach, recognising and building upon the skills, knowledge, assets and capabilities that already exist within local communities. The service helps to improve preparedness and self-sufficiency during periods of disruption by supporting communities to:
- identify local resources
- volunteers
- vulnerable residents
- communication arrangements
- community assets
Particular emphasis has been placed on communities located within flood risk areas, reflecting Lincolnshire's exposure to severe weather and flooding events. Community resilience plans are designed to help local communities prepare for and respond to incidents such as widespread flooding, prolonged power outages, severe weather and other emergencies. This enables them to support vulnerable residents and coordinate local actions before external assistance arrives.
This proactive approach:
- strengthens community resilience
- enhances local preparedness
- supports a more coordinated response to emergencies
- contributes to the efficient use of emergency service resources by enabling communities to play an active role in managing the impacts of disruptive events
- ensure LFR remains focused on protecting those most at risk and maintaining critical service delivery
Collaboration
Collaboration remains a fundamental component of the service delivery model. It plays a vital role in ensuring the service can effectively respond to the increasingly complex and evolving risks facing communities. Recognising that many community safety challenges cannot be addressed by a single organisation in isolation, the service worked closely with a broad range of local, regional and national partners to deliver coordinated, efficient and sustainable outcomes.
Partnership working extends across:
- emergency services
- local authorities
- health organisations
- housing providers
- voluntary and community sector organisations
- regional and national resilience structures
Through these arrangements, the service is able to:
- share information
- develop joint solutions
- coordinate interventions
- maximise the impact of available resources
- prevent incidents
- protect vulnerable individuals
- respond effectively to emergencies
- support community resilience
Importantly, joint working enables a more integrated approach to risk management, ensuring that resources and expertise are directed towards areas of greatest need. By working collaboratively, duplication of effort is reduced, opportunities for shared learning are created and public resources can be utilised more efficiently.
Partnership activity contributes to the service's commitment to continuous improvement, value for money and public accountability. It provides opportunities to:
- secure external funding
- share specialist knowledge
- improve operational interoperability
- strengthen the resilience of communities across Lincolnshire
Throughout 2025 to 2026, LFR has continued to build upon established partnerships whilst developing new collaborative opportunities aligned to emerging risks, community needs and organisational priorities. These partnerships have supported a wide range of activities across prevention, protection, response, emergency planning and community resilience, ensuring that the service remains responsive to local requirements whilst maintaining alignment with national policy, legislation and sector best practice.
Examples of effective partnerships in 2025 to 2026
- Working with local and national partners to strengthen caravan fire safety awareness as part of the Caravan Safety Partnership. This involved engagement with a number of partices to develop consistent safety messaging and education material for caravan owners, site operatores and visitors.
- Providing motorcyclists with practical advice and awareness through training focused on safety and actions to be taken immediately following a collision through the Biker Down partnership with EMAS and LIVES. The partnership aims to reduce motorcycle casualties, improve awareness and support the objectives of Lincolnshire's Road Safety Partnership.
- The Arson Task Force is a partnership between LFR and Lincolnshire Police. A focus on arson reduction, linking with wider anti-social behaviour issues, has allowed us to support county wide arson reduction initiatives. This year the partnership strengthened with the launch of FireStoppers in Lincolnshire which allows communities to report information confidentially.
- Working with the Environment Agency, Lincolnshire Police and local authority enforcement teams on the Environmental Crime Partnership. Sharing intelligence and targeted interventions to reduce waste crime, fly-tipping, illegal burning and other anti-social behaviour.
- Lincolnshire County Council is the Lead Local Flood Authority (LLFA) which LFR works closely with to strengthen flood resilience and response across the county. Funding was secured through the LLFA to purchase additional flood response pumps and specialist 4x4 towing vehicle, enhancing the ability to respond to flooding incidents.
Performance
The CRMP captures the delivery strategy. The strategy is outlined against four areas:
- safer communities:
- understanding our communities and the risks they face
- being inclusive in our approach and tailoring services to meet the needs of our diverse communities
- working with partners in a targeted, proactive and effective way
- service delivery:
- having competent, confident and skilled staff
- having the right skills, equipment and resources in the right places to reduce risk
- having a learning culture and continually improving what we do and how we do it
- striving to achieve a high level of service
- value for money:
- making objective decisions based on evidence
- making appropriate use of public money and providing best value
- continually monitoring how we perform, sharing what we do, and embracing best practice from others
- people:
- becoming an employer of choice through building a diverse, inclusive, and supportive workplace that enables our people to thrive in a safe environment
- giving our people the skills required to perform to the best of their ability and provide them with opportunities to realise their full potential
- being role models, showing visible and inclusive leadership and challenging behaviour that falls short of our high standards
Over the four year period of the CRMP, strategic priorities are identified and captured against these four areas.
The strategic priorities are reviewed on an annual basis. They form the foundation of the annual service plan. In addition, a number of key performance indicators are used to assess progress against the service priorities. The KPIs represent the outcomes required from service delivery, with the aim of working together to keep our communities safe. In 2025 to 2026 the following KPIs were used and measured:
- total incidents - 7,632 which represents an increase of 16% on 2024 to 2025
- total fires - 2,069 fires which represents a 19% increase on 2023 to 2024
- fire fatalities and injuries - 10 fire fatalities, an increase of six on the 2024 to 2025 year. 36 primary fire casualties, a decrease of 2 compared to 2024 to 2025
- accidental dwelling fires - 322 incidents, a decrease of 5 (1.5%) compared with 2024 to 2025
- deliberate primary and secondary fires - 183 deliberate primary fires, an increase of 25 (16%) compared with 2024 to 2025. 402 deliberate secondary fires, an increase of 64 (19%)
- road traffic collisions - killed and seriously injured - 430 people killed or seriously injured on Lincolnshire’s roads during 2025 to 2026. This represents a 5% increase on the previous year
- percentage of home fire safety visits (HFSVs) carried out to those who are vulnerable - 91.4% of our HFSVs were to households with at least one vulnerable occupant, an increase of 4.5% on the previous year
- response standards - our average response time to dwelling fires was 10 minutes 37 seconds compared with our target of 11 minutes, an increase of 53 seconds on last year. Average response time to all other incidents was 12 minutes 24 seconds compared with our target of 15 minutes, an increase of 35 seconds on last year
The risk and intelligence team also measure agreed outputs of service delivery. These are targeted activities that allow us to achieve our required outcomes, for example:
- number of HFSVs - 9,141 HFSVs carried out, a decrease of 2% on the previous year
- number of fire safety audits carried out - 434 audits on premises in the RBIP, out of the 416 premises targeted for the year
Continuous improvement
In 2025 to 2026, the service identified two minor amendments or additions to strategic priorities:
- service priority one - we will have sustainable and scalable interventions in place to mitigate the risks likely to affect our communities
- service priority four - we will monitor, support and carry out duties as required under the Civil Contingencies Act
This resulted in an increase from 15 to 16 priorities.
The progress made against each of these is identified in the following pages.