Part 1: Emergency Services Collaboration Chapter 2: Police and Crime Commissioners: Fire and Rescue Functions Section 7: Involvement of police and crime commissioner in fire and rescue authority
To encourage collaboration in areas where a PCC does not take on responsibility for fire and rescue, these provisions enable a PCC to be represented on an FRA (outside of London) with voting rights, where the FRA agrees.
	The provisions reflect the different governance arrangements that apply to the different kinds of FRA. The basic position under section 1 of the 2004 Act is that, in England, in a non-metropolitan area, the FRA is either the county council, or the district council where there is no county council. In a metropolitan county it is the metropolitan county FRA. The Secretary of State may by order make a scheme constituting an FRA for the combined area of two or more existing FRAs and these are called combined FRAs.
	An FRA which is a non-metropolitan county council may operate "executive arrangements" or a "committee system" in order to provide governance for fire and rescue services. Executive arrangements involve either an elected mayor or council leader; and two or more councillors of the authority area as appointed by the elected mayor/ council leader. The committee system operates a decision making process in accordance with the Local Government Act 1972. The authority may appoint a committee and that committee may appoint sub-committees. Members of the committee or sub-committee are not required to be members of the appointing authority or committee.
	Metropolitan county FRAs are established under section 26 of the Local Government Act 1985 and their membership is comprised of councillors appointed from the constituent councils of the authority. The FRA is able to establish committees and sub-committees to provide governance functions and members of these committees are not required to be members of the authority. Decisions are made by a majority of members of the authority voting with the person presiding having a casting vote if necessary.
	The arrangements for the exercise of functions by a combined FRA are set out in the scheme under which the FRA is constituted.
	It is also possible, under the provisions of the 2009 Act (as amended by the Cities and Local Government Devolution Act 2016), for a combined authority to exercise FRA functions. Powers in the 2009 Act would enable similar provision for PCC representation in such a combined authority.
	The provisions of section 7 amend existing local government legislation to provide for PCCs to be represented on county, combined and metropolitan fire and rescue authorities. Under these provisions a PCC may request to be represented on a committee, joint committee or sub-committee that is exercising (whether wholly or partly) functions of a non metropolitan FRA. The appointing authority or committee must then consider the request and give their reasons for agreeing or refusing the request. In the interest of transparency, the authority or committee must also publish those reasons in such manner as they think appropriate. Where a PCC’s request is agreed, the appointing authority or committee will make arrangements for the PCC’s appointment to committees to attend, speak at and vote at meetings to ensure that the PCC’s participation is meaningful. A PCC may similarly request to attend, speak and vote at meetings of the principal council and the same procedure applies. Subsection (9) makes mirror provision in relation to PCC participation in meetings of the executive and committees of the executive. Subsections (5) to (7) enable a PCC to become a member of a metropolitan FRA and subsections (10) to (12) amend section 3 of the 2004 Act to make provision for the appointment of a PCC to a combined FRA.
	New paragraph 6ZA(4) of Schedule 12 to the Local Government Act 1972 (as inserted by subsection (3)) provides that the PCC will also be treated as if they were a member of a non-metropolitan county FRA for the purposes of matters such as receiving meeting papers, calling extraordinary meetings and determining meeting quorums. It will also be possible for PCCs to be the chair or vice-chair of an FRA – this will be a matter for local determination. However, PCCs will not be able to claim expenses as a member of an FRA – they will claim expenses in relation to their role as a PCC. Amendments to section 26 of the Local Government Act 1985 (subsection (6)) provide that PCCs will become members of metropolitan FRAs and will therefore have the same rights as other metropolitan FRA members.
	New paragraph 6ZA(2)(a) of Schedule 12 to and new section 102(9) of the Local Government Act 1972 and new paragraph section 4A(2) of Schedule A1 to the Local Government Act 2000 provide that a PCC is only to be represented on an FRA so far as the business relates to fire and rescue. Therefore, where a non-metropolitan county council does not have a dedicated sub-committee for fire, any attendance, speaking and voting rights extended to PCCs will be restricted to matters affecting fire and rescue and do not extend to issues relating to the authority’s other services.