Monday 9 February 2004 - News - Fire safety
Concern over plans for regional fire control centre
Plans to merge County
based fire brigade control rooms in the south east of England are
being 'strongly opposed' by firefighters representatives.
The Fire Brigades Union (FBU) said that at present all brigades operate their own control rooms. However it claimed that under plans issued by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (ODPM) emergency fire calls made in the south east would be routed to just one single control centre covering, Kent, East Sussex, West Sussex, Surrey, Hampshire, Isle of Wight, Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire.
FBU regional control representative, Ian Smith, said: "Control room staff in County fire control rooms have a wealth of local knowledge. The entire plan is purely economically driven and this will certainly affect public safety and the safety of firefighters.
"Knowledge of the area we are serving is critical and will be lost overnight when we are expected to deal with incidents within such a large area.
"Each brigade has differing and varying procedures which reflect local needs and risks, which would mean that staff in a regional control centre would find it extremely difficult to effectively deal with a serious incident in a different brigade."
Angie Bell
The Fire Brigades Union (FBU) said that at present all brigades operate their own control rooms. However it claimed that under plans issued by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (ODPM) emergency fire calls made in the south east would be routed to just one single control centre covering, Kent, East Sussex, West Sussex, Surrey, Hampshire, Isle of Wight, Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire.
FBU regional control representative, Ian Smith, said: "Control room staff in County fire control rooms have a wealth of local knowledge. The entire plan is purely economically driven and this will certainly affect public safety and the safety of firefighters.
"Knowledge of the area we are serving is critical and will be lost overnight when we are expected to deal with incidents within such a large area.
"Each brigade has differing and varying procedures which reflect local needs and risks, which would mean that staff in a regional control centre would find it extremely difficult to effectively deal with a serious incident in a different brigade."
Angie Bell
