Hampshire Fire and Rescue Service Plan 2012 to 2015

Our trend in council tax compared with other combined fire and rescue authorities

The part of the council tax that relates to the fire service in Hampshire is well below the national average, and that of similar fire and rescue authorities.  

We aim to make sure that our average council tax rise is less than the increase in state pensions.  

An average household in council tax band D paid £61.38 towards the cost of our service in 2010 to 2011.

In 2009 we set a target to make £3.2 million efficiency savings before 2012. We have beaten this target and made £4.4million efficiency savings between 2008 to 2009 and 2010 to 2011.  

Net spending (not including capital spending) for every 1,000 of the population

We like to compare how much we spend per head of the population compared with other fire and rescue authorities. The graph shows that we spend much less for every 1,000 of the population compared with the national average. Yet we manage to deliver an excellent fire and rescue service in Hampshire!  

We believe that we provide excellent value for money, and this is supported by positive comments from the Audit Commission, who said that we:

• have a strong awareness of the current and future financial challenges we face;
• have worked to deliver cost savings to meet future funding issues;
• have overall costs which compare well with others;
• have clearly set out and consulted the public, businesses, staff, trade unions and so on on prioritising services within tighter budgets; and
• have actively involved our staff in identifying and prioritising efficiency savings.