Organisational Culture in the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service

14. In England a Core Code of Ethics for Fire and Rescue Services⁽²⁾ has been issued. The Code sets out five ethical principles which are designed to provide a basis for promoting good behaviour and challenging inappropriate behaviour. The foundation for those principles is contained in a UK government publication⁽³⁾.

15. On 18 May 2021 the Fire Standards Board published a Code of Ethics. The role of the Fire Standards Board is to oversee the identification, organisation, development and maintenance of professional standards for fire and rescue services in England.

16. The Core Code, and the Code of Ethics, are used as reference documents by His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services (HMICFRS) when inspecting English Fire and Rescue Services.

17. The Scottish Parliament is considering the Police (Ethics, Conduct and Scrutiny) (Scotland) Bill. The Bill makes provision about the ethical standards of the Police Service of Scotland, procedures for dealing with and the consequences of certain conduct by constables and how policing in Scotland is scrutinised. Among other things this Bill would require the police to have a code of ethics. There is currently no similar legislation or plans for a code of ethics for the fire and rescue service in Scotland.

18. In April 2023 an internal draft paper was prepared recommending that the SFRS considers adoption of the National Fire Chiefs Council’s (NFCC) core code of ethics. It is unclear why this paper remained in draft format and was not further progressed. A revised draft paper was prepared in November 2024, recommending to the SFRS Culture Development Group, (CDG), that following a review of the alignment and experience of other fire and rescue services in relation to the NFCC Core Code of Ethics, that SFRS look to adopt and embed the Core Code of Ethics within the SFRS. Whilst there are undoubted benefits in doing this, for example, aligning the Service to the rest of the fire sector in the UK, we would caution against making any integration of ethics and values overly complex as this may reduce their resonance with staff. As part of this work the Service should consider comprehensive engagement with staff to ensure that any revision resonates with, and matters to personnel.

19. In addition to contributing to the development of the core code of ethics, the NFCC has a selection of development tools and products to support fire and rescue services in the UK to improve culture. The NFCC Culture Action Plan describes culture as the identity and practices of an organisation and its employees. The NFCC has created a culture dashboard which is a tool to monitor and understand the culture of an organisation. The dashboard supports services in monitoring and understanding their culture, identifying key issues and successful practices, enabling conversations between staff and leadership on values, culture, fairness, ethics and diversity and supporting evidence-based action. The NFCC is a membership association of which the SFRS is a member. As such the SFRS has access to the products and services available to other fire and rescue services. We suggest a greater engagement with additional available resources.