Emergency Services Collaboration
Sections 22A to 23I of the 1996 Act make provision for collaboration agreements entered into either by two or more policing bodies (which includes local policing bodies) or by the chief officer of police of one or more police forces and two or more policing bodies. The governance of FRAs is provided for in the Fire and Rescue Services Act 2004 ("the 2004 Act"). Sections 13 to 14 of the 2004 Act require FRAs to enter into mutual assistance schemes with other FRAs and make provision for the Secretary of State to make directions about such schemes and sections 16 and 17 enable FRAs to enter into agreements with other such authorities or other persons for that other authority or person to discharge certain of their statutory functions and make provision for the Secretary of State to make directions about these arrangements. The governance of ambulance services in England is provided for in the National Health Service Act 2006, under that Act the ten ambulance services in England are constituted as NHS Trusts of NHS Foundation Trusts.
	Part 1 of the 2004 Act provides for FRAs for England and Wales. Section 1 sets out which authority is the FRA for an area – this is subject to sections 2 to 4 which provide for the making of schemes, by order, for the creation of a combined FRA for two or more areas and for combined fire authorities under the Fire Services Act 1947 to continue to exist. Currently in England the FRA is, in a non metropolitan area, either the district council where there is no county council or – where there is a county council – that county council. In a metropolitan county it is the metropolitan county FRA, in Greater London the London Fire and Emergency Planning Authority and in the Isles of Scilly the Council is the FRA. The 2004 Act also in particular sets out the core functions of FRAs (although an FRA has statutory functions under other legislation, for example, as a category 1 responder under the Civil Contingencies Act 2004), and the role of the Secretary of State in setting out a Fire and Rescue National Framework and supervision. As with PCCs, the 2009 Act (as amended by the Cities and Local Government Devolution Act 2016) would enable the functions of an FRA to be undertaken by the directly elected mayor of a combined authority area.