Government funding of the Chief Fire Officers’ Association (CFAO) announced: FiReControl

Government funding of the Chief Fire Officers’ Association (CFAO) have been announced.

In a parliamentary written question and answer the funding provided by the Government to the Chief Fire Officers’ Association (CFAO) have been announced a follows:

From 2005 to 2010/11 (YTD) funding for the FiReControl project to CFAO has totalled £1.3m.

Source: http://www.theyworkforyou.com/wrans/?id=2010-07-15b.7917.h

Regionalisation of Emergency Fire Controls – Letter to Prime Minister David Cameron

CIRCULAR: 2010HOC0336MW

14 May 2010

TO: ALL MEMBERS

Dear Brother / Sister

REGIONALISATION OF EMERGENCY FIRE CONTROLS – LETTER TO PRIME MINISTER

Members will be aware from our long running lobbying and campaigning that the Conservative and Liberal Democrat parties have both expressed very clear opposition to the Regionalisation of Fire Controls in England. The two parties now form the new Government.

Attached is a letter to the Prime Minister seeking a commitment from the Government to honour the pledges made on this issue prior to the election; the text of the letter also appears below.

Yours fraternally

MATT WRACK

GENERAL SECRETARY

 Download the letter to the Prime Minister as a PDF

Text of letter to the Prime Minister:

14 May 2010

The Rt Hon David Cameron MP

Prime Minister, First Lord of the Treasury and Minister for the Civil Service

10 Downing Street

London

SW1A 2AA

Dear Prime Minister

FIRE AND RESCUE SERVICE – REGIONALISATION OF EMERGENCY FIRE CONTROLS

I am writing in regard to the new Government’s stance on the CLG FiReControl Project (Regionlisation of Emergency Fire Controls).

In the light of comments made before and during the election by Conservative spokepersons, firefighters will be watching closely the steps taken by the new Government. You may recall that you were asked by a Firefighter (Graham Donaldson) in Yorkshire on 24 April about the Fire Service. You said:

“One thing we would do to try and stop waste is the Regionalisation of Fire Service, the so-called ‘Fire Control Scheme; it was going to cost £100 million, it’s now costing £420 million. We will want to stop that in its tracks.”

We also noted comments on FiReControl in Conservative policy green paper, Control Shift: returning power to Local Communities (February 2010), which stated:

“We will… abandon plans to regionlise Fire Control (while providing new measures to enhance resilience in the case of a national emergency).” It added: “A Conservative government will follow the Scottish example and ditch this botched project, where such regional centres have not yet gone live. We will, instead, upgrade a small number of existing fire control centres to enable them to act as national ’super centres’ in the extreme case of a national emergency.” (p.27, p.31)

We are also aware of Liberal Democrat opposition to Regional Controls. In March this year, the then Party Spokesperson Julia Goldsworthy told the FBU’s Firefighter magazine that the Government should think again over FiReControl. She said:

“The Liberal Democrats are opposed to the Government’s plans to centralise Fire Control. This project will  mean vital knowledge is lost and this could risk the response time to incidents. The project has already proved to be too expensive and is likely to make the Service less rather than more responsive. WE have called for the project to be stopped and for existing Control Rooms to be upgraded as necessary to ensure the communications benefits sought by Government are dleivered by local Fire Brigade Control Rooms, as they will be in Scotland and are in Wales, without the need for Regionlisation.”

Given the wide political agreement between both Government parties on this issue, we would like an understanding from you that the FiReControl project will be scrapped, with a timetable for this process and for the upgrading of existing Control Rooms.

Your faithfully

MATT WRACK

General Secretary

Fire Brigades Union

cc:

The Rt Hon Nick Clegg MP – Deputy Prime Minister, Lord President of the Council

Eric Pickles MP – Secretary of State Communities and Local Government

Related Links

No.10 Downing Street

The Conservative Party

Liberal Democrats Party

Department of Communities and Local Government

Pay Claim 2010

CIRCULAR: 2010HOC0316MW

05 May 2010

TO: ALL MEMBERS

Dear Brother / Sister

PAY CLAIM 2010

Members will be aware that the Union’s position on pay has been to seek a long-term formula such as existed prior to 2002. This would avoid the potential of difficulties arising in relation to annual pay bargaining and would provide the stability which we think is necessary for delivering a first-class Fire and Rescue Service. Regrettably the Fire and Rescue Service Employers have consistently rejected such an approach.

The Executive Council has given consideration to the issue of pay for 2010. This has included consultation with Brigade, Regional and Sectional Committees. Following this discussion it was agreed to submit a pay claim for 2010 as follows: That there should be an increase in all NJC rates of pay equal to the percentage increase in inflation as identified by the Retail Price Index (RPI) for June 2010.

This is an extremely moderate claim but one which is based on the principle that Firefighters’ pay should increase so as to ensure that living standards can be maintained. It is also clear to us any attempt to reduce real wages would have a dangerous and detrimental impact on the prospects for economic recovery.

Firefighters have seen significant changes to their roles and responsibilities since 2004 and they have the right to expect that their pay will not suffer real reductions after demonstrating such commitment to the development of an outstanding public service.

This claim has now been communicated to the Employers. Members will be kept informed of developments.

Best wishes.

Yours fraternally

MATT WRACK

GENERAL SECRETARY

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