French firefighters feeling excluded and undervalued in the early phase of Covid-19

Feedback from the field unanimously deplores unprecedented feelings of exclusion, frustration and dysfunction among the fire services, from both the operational staff and management,  during the first phase of this crisis, concludes a report by the National Federation of French Firefighters (FNSPF).

“The scale and intensity of the COVID-19 crisis has certainly put our emergency services system to the test, highlighting both strengths and weaknesses of our crisis management model”, reads the introduction to the report.

The feeling of exclusion and frustration among firefighters was the product of over centralization: the state’s initial instinct to manage the crisis centrally by not relying enough on the resources and knowledge in the regions and municipalities.

“The decision to entrust the territorial management of this crisis to the Ministry of Health, which lacked a culture in this area and fell outside the power of the prefects, led to the uneven, partial and uncoordinated mobilisation of territorial resources, creating a general feeling of complexity, dysfunction and a loss of efficiency… and has reduced our response capacity by a significant part”.

In creating this document, the FNSPF seeks to make recommendations to the managerial and governing bodies of the SIS, the civil protection supervisory authorities and the public authorities, in particular with regard to the establishment of a fully fledged concept for interministerial and interdepartmental crisis management.

The full report can be found at:
https://www.ctif.org/sites/default/files/2021-03/COVID-19_Cris_Synthesis_Report%20%281%29.pdf

Source: CTIF