People Awards

Long service and good conduct medals

We were delighted to welcome His Majesty’s Lord-Lieutenant of Devon, Miss Katharine Davidson Kings Council, to present eight Long Service and Good Conduct medals.

Five colleagues were recognised for 20 years’ service, two for serving 30 years, and firefighter Terence Reynolds received the accolade for 40 years of service, responding to emergencies since 1983. 

All eight awards reflect exceptional personal achievements and public service, and it was a pleasure to be joined by the families of award recipients to share the moment.

People awards

In June, Service staff were invited to submit nominations for eight award categories.

With 90 people and teams nominated by their peers for going above and beyond in their work, the judging panel had a very difficult job shortlisting and choosing who to award ‘highly commended’ and ‘winners’ in each category.

The awards celebrated teams and individuals whose passion, team spirit, resilience, inclusiveness, and commitment has had such a positive impact on their colleagues and communities.

The breadth of the work highlighted at the event showed how all operational and support roles across the Service contribute to achieving our purpose: to protect and save. 
Collectively, the winners of the People Awards have brought communities and teams together, reduced the environmental impact of, supported colleagues, made our communities safer and made a real difference to how we work together.

Chief Fire Officer Gavin Ellis said: “I feel truly humbled to hear the outstanding achievements of my colleagues and the incredible work they are doing day in, day out. I am incredibly proud to be Chief Fire Officer of a Service filled with so many inspiring and committed people."

He also highlighted the important role families play:

“This Service can’t operate and thrive just on our people alone. I want to personally thank family members for all the support and sacrifices they give to allow their loved ones to do what they do to keep people safe. I consider family members to be an important part of this Service and our cause.”

With the fire service workforce spread over two counties, the event was a rare opportunity for colleagues from different teams to come together. It was great to also have the support of our Fire Cadets from Bovey Tracy and Members of the Fire and Rescue Authority.

Staff achievements:

• Development of a training and assessment approach that provides a high standard of incident command training for our operational colleagues.
• Work on a new updated system for our control team that will help mobilise resources to incidents.
• The positive, can-do approach of those working in our risk, insurance, and business continuity team whose work is critical in helping the Service to manage key risks.
• An initiative that brings together current and retired firefighters at Honiton station.
• Efforts to increase environmental awareness across the Service and enable us to develop an action plan to reduce our emissions, and fleet and estate costs.
• Assessments and audits that made a difference to the Service’s health and safety performance and improved the health, safety, and welfare of colleagues.
• Showing commitment to the community and colleagues to reduce incidents.
• A push for colleagues to reach their full fitness potential and better blood and cholesterol testing for our firefighters.
• Delivering drill nights in a fun innovative way.
• Challenging perspectives, opinions, and behaviours, encouraging people to speak up when things aren’t right.