West Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Authority has become the first fire and rescue service to achieve the Excellence Standard for its equality and diversity work under the Fire and Rescue Services Equality Framework, which it helped pilot alongside the Local Government Improvement and Development Agency.

The equality framework has replaced all other diversity strategy frameworks and has three achievement levels: developing achieving and excellent.The priority areas of performance are leadership and promoting inclusion, accountability, effective service delivery and community engagement, employment and training
evaluation and sharing good practice.

West Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Authority says it is important to pursue a diversity strategy when dealing with local communities.

"Having a diverse workforce helps us to better communicate safety messages with the communities we are trying to reach," said Maria Tonks, West Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Authority’s quality and diversity manager.

Chief fire officer Simon Pilling said: "The real significance of reaching the 'Excellence' standard is not that we champion equality and diversity by ticking boxes about the way we recruit, train and evaluate what we do, it's about the fact that we respect and work with our diverse communities to improve the way we deliver local services."