Date: 15th May, 2026
The National Fire Chiefs Council (NFCC) has recently published a review into the On-Call Firefighter system. Carried out by Exact Consultant Ltd, it looks at the long-term sustainability of the on-call duty system across the UK and Crown Dependencies.
In the review, it identifies the below key issues and challenges:
- Recruitment and retention remain fragile, with socio-demographic changes, high personal commitment, and limited employer support reducing the available pool.
- Training and competence requirements are increasingly onerous and inflexible, designed around wholetime standards and poorly adapted to the needs of an on-call workforce. Rigid role maps, limited flexibility and poor work-life balance deter potential recruits, and stifle change.
- Cultural barriers persist, a wide perception of a ‘two-tier system’ between wholetime and on-call staff undermines morale, with many on-call firefighters reporting feeling under-valued or treated as “second class”.
- The system is fragmented, with multiple different approaches to managing on-call firefighters in the retained duty system across the UK, leading to duplication, inefficiency, and missed opportunities for sharing learning and good practice.
- Variations in local governance, limited operational independence for Chief Fire Officers have created inconsistency and inefficiency across the system. Shortcomings on funding, and national direction hinder reform and prevent innovation from developing beyond local short-term projects.
- Current measures of performance, particularly availability, do not effectively reflect community risk. Inconsistent data quality and fragmented approaches make benchmarking and workforce planning difficult.
To view the full review, head over to the NFCC’s website – nfcc.org.uk/on-call-research-study/
Read their full press release on their website – NFCC publishes national review of on-call firefighter system – NFCC.