Around 900 people work for Nottinghamshire Fire and Rescue Service, in a range of exciting, challenging and rewarding roles.
Most of our staff are wholetime and retained firefighters who respond to a variety of emergency incidents, such as fires, floods and road traffic collisions, and carry out regular home safety checks as well as much more.
However, we also employ staff in a number of other roles who are paramount in keeping the organisation's wheels turning – these include Fire Control operators, who receive and manage 999 calls, Fire Protection Officers who are responsible for Fire Safety legislation, community safety and education experts, and a team of support staff that covers administration, performance monitoring
, training, vehicle maintenance, equipment development, property management, mapping, ICT, human resources, corporate communications and finance.
All of our staff are passionate about serving our communities and, ultimately, helping to create a safer Nottinghamshire.
If you're interested in joining our team, please look at our
Careers page.
Managing the Service.
Nottinghamshire Fire and Rescue Service is managed day-to-day by the Chief Fire Officer, John Buckley, on behalf of the Nottinghamshire and City of Nottingham Fire Authority.
He is supported by a Deputy Chief Fire Officer, Craig Parkin, and an Assistant Chief Officer, Ian Pritchard, who assist him in delivering the Service's
vision. John, Craig and Ian are all then supported by a number of other senior managers who form the Service's Strategic Leadership Team and the Executive Delivery Team.
Meet the Chief Fire Officer team.
John Buckley, Chief Fire Officer
John began his fire and rescue service career in Derbyshire in 1994 as an on-call firefighter. In 1996, after a 10-year career in the textiles industry he then joined Nottinghamshire Fire and Rescue Service as a wholetime firefighter. In his early years, he held various operational roles, becoming a Trainer at the Service Development Centre in Ollerton and a District Manager in Service Delivery.
In 2005, John was appointed Area Manager holding a number of departmental managerial roles and leading on significant projects around shift change and workforce flexibility. In 2008 he became ACFO and subsequently DCFO with responsibility for Service Delivery. He then took up the role of Chief Fire Officer in April 2014.
He graduated from Nottingham Trent University having undertaken his Masters’ degree in 2009, and is also proud to have completed the Top Management Programme through the National School of Government.
John is active within the National Fire Chiefs Council where he is a member of the Sustainability Project Board and the Secretary for the East Midlands Regional Strategic Board. He is also Regional Chair for the Fire Leaders Association.
His vision for Nottinghamshire Fire and Rescue Service is based on three principles: delivering high quality services; good governance and financial sustainability and maintaining an engaged and motivated workforce. This has been evident during his tenure as Chief Fire Officer as he has led the organisation through significant change.
John is passionate about The Fire Fighters Charity because of the support it provides to fire and rescue service staff and their families. He is the Service Champion and gets involved in many local activities including an annual Chief’s Challenge which usually raises over £10,000 for the charity.
When he is not on duty, John enjoys spending time with his family and their pets and escaping to the inland waterways on their much-treasured narrowboat.
Craig Parkin, Deputy Chief Fire Officer
With a 23-year career within Nottinghamshire Fire and Rescue Service, Craig has served at Dunkirk, Central, Stockhill and West Bridgford and spent some time at the NFRS Service Development Centre.
As a Group Manager, Craig spent some periods working at NFRS headquarters as well as taking charge of frontline firefighting operations for the south of the county.
His current responsibilities since July 2018 includes prevention, protection and response within the Service Delivery directorate, and People and Organisational Development having previously overseen Support Services for the organisation.
Prior to joining Nottinghamshire Craig spent six years in the British Army’s Royal Engineers and numerous roles in the private sector over a four-year period. He holds several Diplomas from both Coventry and Nottingham Trent University’s, a Master’s in Disaster Management and has completed the Executive Leadership Programme in 2013/14.
He is actively engaged across a range of NFCC work areas, including the East Midlands National Operational Guidance team as strategic sponsor, East Midlands Emergency Services Network Strategic lead, East Midlands Health and Safety Group strategic chair as well as NFCC’s National Operational Effectiveness Working Group as health and safety liaison and NFCC National Health and Safety Committee member.
He was made temporary Assistant Chief Fire Officer in December 2013. He has since become a permanent ACFO for NFRS.
In February 2019 he was successful in securing the positon of Deputy Chief Fire Officer.
Candida Brudenell, Assistant Chief Fire Officer
Candida joined Nottinghamshire Fire and Rescue Service in June 2020 as our new Assistant Chief Fire Officer.
Candida joined the Service with a wealth of local government experience having spent 33 years at Nottingham City Council, where she started her career as an apprentice town planner. She undertook several roles with the City Council, overseeing projects in the voluntary sector, Education department, and Children and Adult Services, before being appointed Assistant Chief Executive / Corporate Director of Strategy and Resources.
In her final role with the City Council, Candida had responsibility for corporate functions including Finance, IT, HR, Procurement and Communications and Marketing.
As the Assistant Chief Fire Officer at Nottinghamshire Fire and Rescue Service, Candida has responsibility for Corporate Support within the Service, which includes ICT, Corporate Communications, Performance and Planning, and Corporate Administration.
