March 2023 marked only the third time that the prestigious Gareth Wilkinson Memorial Award has been presented by British APCO with the worthy recipient, at our annual dinner, Tony Bracey from Welsh Government.
It was in spring 2004, in the days when the annual BAPCO event was held at the Islington Business Design centre, that Gareth Wilkinson, a senior officer with Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue service, and a leading light in the North West & North Wales for British APCO, was tragically taken from us all too soon. In late 2004, the British ACPO Executive Committee put in place a policy document outlining the setting up of the Gareth Wilkinson Memorial Award with the objective of commemorating Gareth and all that he did for British APCO. The aim of the award is “to acknowledge the outstanding contribution and meritorious service given by an individual BAPCO member to enable the Association to achieve its purpose.”
The 2023 recipient, Tony Bracey, has made a huge contribution to the aims and objectives of the Association. He has been instrumental in taking the British APCO sponsored Multi Agency Incident Transfer protocol – MAIT for short – to the next stage through his work across the user organisations in Wales, keeping interested parties such as London Fire and the Maritime & Coastguard Agency informed of progress, as well as working with key MAIT suppliers to make it happen. As part of the Joint Emergency Services Group in Wales he has championed MAIT. And we are all hoping that 2023 will be a real watershed for the protocol that was born out of the coroner’s inquest into the London Bombings of July 2005; first we had ‘Direct Electronic Incident Transfer’, which is still used by several emergency agencies, and today we have MAIT, which is gathering both user and supplier support.
Tony shared his surprise at being given the award as he thanked British APCO adding, "I suppose this demonstrates that persistence pays off! I would like to say that MAIT is just one example of how British APCO has and continues to support innovation and collaboration across the Emergency Services and responder community in the UK. They have wholeheartedly supported us in Wales, developing, testing and deploying MAIT, which quite frankly over the years nearly broke all of us at some point or another. With the procurement across FRS in England we hope to now move up a gear.
“MAIT is just one example of an organisation which, when needed, has the leadership, network and membership to bring together the right people to achieve what sometimes feels like the impossible. A sincere thank you to all the team at British APCO, past, present and those who sadly are no longer with us for their continued patience, support and guidance."
British APCO will be holding a MAIT focussed event in the coming months, the details of which will be shared soon. In the meantime, you can find out more about MAIT on our website here.
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