FOCUS
Hard talk This article begins a debate by looking at big
challenges for fire and other public services, and asks crucial questions needing answers
ILL GATES once said ‘we always overestimate the change that will occur in the next two years and underestimate the change that will occur in the next ten’, and this can apply just as well to fire and rescue services (FRSs). No different from the rest of society, the UK FRSs must adapt and thrive because the collisions between technology, business and society are far reaching and are happening at pace. Emerging successfully from this will require organisations to face this future head on. As a result of this, FRSs must make sure that doing the ‘day job’ of the next two years does not prevent them from achieving the state of readiness they need to be relevant in ten years’ time.
B Changing world
The UK population is growing – it is expected to reach 74 million in 2039 – and ageing and becoming more diverse. As the population increases, so also does the amount of time spent in poor health and the complexity of those conditions. This has profound
50 MARCH 2020
www.frmjournal.com
implications for the public and for workers within FRSs. There is significant evidence to indicate that health, wellbeing and deprivation are all factors that lead to an individual, a family or a community being at greater risk of requiring public service interventions. In addition, the earth’s climate is changing:
we have seen 15 of the 16 warmest years on record since 2000, surface CO2
above
400ppm (parts per million) for the whole of 2016 for the first time, and average sea level rising to 82mm above the 1993 average. We are expecting the impact of these changes to be more extreme weather conditions, and these will lead to fl ooding and heatwaves that disproportionately affect the most vulnerable in society. A hyper connected world has been
created by the digital revolution together with accelerated development of new forms of social organisation. We can be more connected than ever; geography is no limit. With new skills and tools creating whole new industries, the workforce is evolving rapidly also.
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