THE Staffordshire Commissioner has been quizzed on a trial which has seen reduced crew numbers for on-call firefighters.
A meeting saw Ben Adams asked about the move to reduce the minimum figure from four after it emerged a crew of three took the decision to enter a burning building recently.
The Commissioner said the move was being reviewed – but that it had led to a person’s life being saved.
He said:
“If a crew of three are first in attendance at a house fire, they would not typically tackle that themselves. There is a caveat there in that firefighters can make operational decisions in the interest of safety at any incident.
“In the main, if a three-person crew is first at a house fire, they will endeavour to make the area safe and prepare equipment – essentially make the operational team that follows on enhance their capacity to deal with the situation.
“I think the strongest concern, particularly of the Fire Brigades’ Union who have a position of absolute resistance to this three-party crew, is what they call the moral dilemma that a firefighter may feel obliged in a situation like that.
“I feel that is a very reasonable argument and it’s the primary reason for the pilot, to try and understand the nature of the incidents that firefighters are addressing and to establish clear accepted action.
“I believe there was one case where, at a house fire, a team of three intervened and saved a life. It is currently live and being reviewed.
“I’m going to wait for the officers and professionals to come back to me with their conclusions on that. I’m keen to understand exactly how that occurred and what the decisions were.”
The move to reduce the number of retained firefighters on a crew to three from four has led to concerns being raised by the Fire Brigades Union and councillors.
A report to a Police, Fire and Crime Panel meeting revealed that availability of on-call appliances had increased by 11% during the pilot – and that on average a three-person crew arriving first at a scene was almost ten minutes quicker than the next fully-crewed appliance.
Mr Adams told the panel that by mid-September on-call crews had attended 587 emergency incidents.
“This is about getting to incidents sooner, more frequently, retaining on-call firefighters and increasing our chances of recruiting – and I’m pleased to say this year we have increased our headcount by 23.
“That is good news as it has been really hard work to increase our on-call firefighter crews in recent years. And since we last met I believe we have extended the type of incidents they are going to in the pilot to include road traffic situations.
“The pilot is continuing, I’m absolutely comfortable with the direction of travel but I don’t want to pre-judge the outcome of that.
“The key thing for me is it’s all been done in consultation with the crews themselves – it’s feeling very positive at the minute and enhancing safety for communities.”
Commissioner Adams was quizzed about whether any wellbeing or psychological stress had been reported during the pilot period, or whether there had been cases were crews had faced moral dilemmas to go against protocol.
He said:
“I do appreciate this is an issue and a concern for people.
“The pilot is ongoing and I am assured of its safety. I’m certainly assured at the moment that it is delivering results and improving safety for the residents of Staffordshire.
“The pilot is very clear at the moment – house fires are not to be tackled by crews of three, but there may be exceptional circumstances where they make a local decision. That is the nature of their job.”
