Fire and Rescue Services: Suicide Prevention Training

Thursday 12th November 2026 Westminster Hall

13:50

[Luke Akehurst (North Durham) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the matter of suicide prevention training for fire and rescue services.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Efford. I thank the Backbench Business Committee for granting time for this debate and all the hon. Members from across the House who supported the application.

Today, I am backing the Samaritans’ “United with the frontline” campaign to call on the Government to ensure that every fire and rescue service in England has funded mandatory suicide prevention training for all its firefighters. I pay tribute to Samaritans, the UK and Ireland’s largest suicide prevention charity. Every 10 seconds, a Samaritans volunteer responds to a call for help. In 2025, that meant over 3.3 million calls. As well as the helpline, Samaritans works with people in community settings and prisons and provides training across different workplaces, including to fire services in England. Given its incredible service helping to save the lives of people at their most vulnerable, I believe that it is important that we, as policymakers, listen to the voice of Samaritans when deciding how we can best prevent lives being lost to suicide.

Samaritans tells me of a stark picture of the situation today. Last year, 5,728 deaths by suicide were registered in England and the suicide rate reached its highest level in over 20 years. Clearly, there is more that this place can do to support people in their hour of need and prevent the death by suicide of our constituents.

[Liz Twist (Blaydon and Consett) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this important debate. In its briefing, Samaritans highlights not only the 3,200 suicide call-outs that fire crews attend, but the heavy toll on firefighters themselves, with over 60% reporting mental health struggles. Does he agree that mandatory training must work both ways: equipping crews to save lives in the community while building robust workplace support to protect its own staff?

[Luke Akehurst]

I thank my hon. Friend and neighbour for her helpful intervention. I agree that this cuts both ways. It is both about the members of the public that the fire service intervenes with when they are in crisis and the mental health of firefighters themselves. I will come to that point later in my speech.

Fire and rescue services play a key role supporting vulnerable people every day. Their skills are often required in attending complex incidents, meaning that they often interact with the people in society most at risk of suicidal crisis. Increasingly, fire and rescue services are being called out to people in suicidal crisis. In the last decade, the number of call-outs to suicide incidents has sadly tripled. Despite firefighters being more and more expected to support people in crisis, there is no current mandatory in-depth suicide training offer for every firefighter in England. Such provision could train them to spot the signs of suicidality, compassionately open up non-judgmental conversations about suicide and make a safe intervention to stop a suicide.

Exposing the postcode lottery that this gap in provision leads to, Samaritans made freedom of information requests in June last year, which indicated the variation across the country. While eight fire and rescue services had some form of mandatory training relating to suicide prevention, a further 18 only had optional training, while eight more had no suicide prevention or related mental health training whatever. Most commonly, optional training consists of a short e-learning module focused on awareness raising, which, although valuable, is unlikely to equip a firefighter with the skills needed to save a life.

Thankfully, in County Durham, Samaritans found that we do have mandatory operational training on a person in crisis. However, the disparity in provision can be seen just across our one region in the north-east as Cleveland has a non-mandatory version of that training, while Northumberland does not provide any training of this kind. Clearly, a national standard is needed to support fire and rescue services to provide the training that their workers need to respond to complex crises.

It is not just members of the public who are left unsupported by these gaps in training. Firefighters have prolonged contact with their peers in the fire and rescue services who also may be struggling with their mental health, exacerbated by the pressure of their role and the trauma that they often witness. Some 51 deaths by suicide among firefighters were recorded between 2011 and 2018, and 21 suicides by non-senior fire service officers were recorded between 2020 and 2022. A survey found that over 60% of fire service staff and volunteers had experienced mental health problems linked to traumatic events at work. I hope the Minister will outline in his remarks what the Government are doing to ensure that fire and rescue services have the support they need in the workplace to undertake their work while living happy and fulfilled lives.

[Dr Danny Chambers (Winchester) (LD)]

Firefighters and fire crews see traumatic events on a regular basis. Sometimes, on busy days, they get very little time to decompress or debrief between events. There is an amazing guy in Hampshire called Spencer Wragg, a former police officer, who is trying to get a mental health support app put on every police work phone in the country so that the police can get the support when they need it. Does the hon. Gentleman think that something similar should be explored for firefighters?

[Luke Akehurst]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that useful intervention. If that idea is rolled out to the police, it ought also to be rolled out to other emergency responders.

In its first year of operation, the Fire Fighters Charity crisis line received more than 200 calls from firefighters in need of support. I pay tribute to that organisation’s work, providing online resources alongside that helpline. Individual fire and rescue services have also made strides to adopt and trial workplace support tools despite the lack of an overarching national framework.

Although forces have pioneered their own approaches, such as trauma risk management training and peer supporter systems to facilitate supportive conversations between colleagues, our fire and rescue services should not be left on their own when they are already under-resourced and be expected to work out the best mental health provision with no support or guidance from the top. Clearly, this industry needs bespoke mental health support for its workers. Firefighters put their lives on the line to keep us safe; the least we can do is provide them with the support they need for their mental wellbeing.

In discussing any expansion in the role of our fire and rescue services, the voice of firefighters must be front and centre. I urge the Government to engage constructively with the Fire Brigades Union, and I urge the Minister to set out the engagement of the Minister that he is standing in for today, the Under-Secretary of State for Education, with the union on this matter so far.

The evidence that this training can have a real impact is clear. Already, Samaritans and other providers deliver such training to workplaces that request it. The Samaritans’ training and engagement programme has proven that there is demand for workplace training on how to manage conversations about suicide, how to make a suicide intervention and how to manage the effects of a suicide within fire and rescue services. For example, Samaritans has worked with London Fire Brigade to provide such training to about 50 of their workers.

I pay tribute to the provisions on staff welfare that our local fire and rescue authority in County Durham and Darlington provide already. Those include counselling employer assistant programmes, signposting to local professional organisations that specialise in trauma support and utilising the Fire Fighters Charity crisis line, which all UK fire and rescue services subscribe to.

Let me come to the campaign’s asks of the Government and our asks of the Minister who is responding to the debate. Today, I want to back Samaritans’ call for a national approach to delivering suicide prevention training to fire and rescue services. Such a national approach will ensure that every force is equipped to support those in crisis and to save lives. In doing so, the Government would recognise that the support a person receives in a mental health crisis should not vary depending on where in the country they live or what operational decisions their fire and rescue authority has made with its limited resources. I urge the Minister to set out plans for this much-needed approach in his response.

I recognise and welcome steps that have already been taken to address these gaps, including a suicide prevention toolkit, published by the National Fire Chiefs Council, which I know Samaritans was successful in influencing. The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government has launched a public consultation on the creation of a new college of fire and rescue to better align training and national standards across England in order to improve the health and wellbeing of fire and rescue staff. That consultation presents an opportunity to embed suicide prevention training in the improved offer.

Standards should be developed by a working group of suicide prevention experts, with a focus on training that is in-depth, facilitator-led and, where possible, carried out in person. Such training should focus on developing practical skills to support people’s safety through conversations about suicidal thoughts, with the aim of building confidence in signposting people to the right support. Training must also build practical skills in safely managing suicide prevention for someone in crisis. I would appreciate the Minister updating the House on whether suicide prevention training is being looked at as part of that consultation, and on how he will ensure that suicide prevention experts and people with lived experience are at the heart of any proposals.

I am grateful for the support from other hon. Members for this crucial campaign. No one suffering from a severe mental health crisis should ever be left without the support they need. In countless cases our fire and rescue services step in and provide that support. They can often be the literal difference between life and death. We owe it to them, and to everyone in our country who suffers from mental illness or who is at risk of a mental health crisis, to provide the training needed to save lives and begin the road to recovery. I look forward to the Minister’s outlining what the Government are doing to ensure that every fire and rescue service worker receives the training that they need so that all our constituents know that if they or a loved one ever needs that emergency support, they will receive it.

14:01

[Robbie Moore (Keighley and Ilkley) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Efford. I thank the hon. Member for North Durham (Luke Akehurst) for securing this important debate. I commend him on his speech, which went into a huge amount of detail on the suicide prevention training that is absolutely needed for our fire and rescue services.

Across the House we will no doubt agree that when constituents struggle with their mental health and reach out for help our mental health services must be robust and supported enough to deliver that. I draw the House’s attention to a deeply tragic case from my constituency. It brings into focus the devastating consequences of that system breaking down, which has deeply detrimental impacts. Last Friday I met my constituent Christine Meeking. She came to see me after losing her daughter, Nicola, to suicide. In the days before Nicola died, her GP tried on three separate occasions to reach Bradford’s First Response mental health crisis service but could not get through. Christine now carries the unbearable belief that if, from those attempts to reach out, Nicola had received the crisis support and care that she so desperately needed, she might still be here.

The failure did not end there. In my surgery last week Christine told me that, in seeking answers, she herself repeatedly tried calling First Response and was left on hold on the line for 40 minutes before the line cut out. She then tried to phone First Response back and waited for a further 48 minutes. Christine tried to get through for a total of 88 minutes. She made the point rightly to me that to anyone in crisis 88 minutes can seem an eternity. Unfortunately, that is exactly what happened to her daughter Nicola.

After Christine shared her story with me, I raised the issue with the Bradford district care trust and wrote to the Department of Health and Social Care—I know that a Minister from MHCLG is responding in this debate, but that builds the case I will make: that this is a cross-Government and cross-departmental issue. The trust’s reply to the concerns that I raised on behalf of Christine Meeking was not satisfactory. It was a standard letter designed specifically to pass the blame. I wrote to the Department of Health and Social Care on 7 August, but I am yet to receive a response on behalf of my constituent. That is simply not good enough, especially when we are nearly at the middle of November. In that time, Christine has rightly asked if the system that we are expected to rely on is suitable and fit for purpose. Clearly, it is not.

Christine has shown extraordinary courage in coming forward and meeting me. She did so simply to get that point across. She told me that, although nothing can bring back her daughter, if speaking out can save just one family from going through what she has suffered, it will be worth it.

That brings me to the subject of the debate: ensuring that our fire and rescue services receive suicide prevention training. Nicola’s experience demonstrates just how critical the first response is, and it does not always come from a mental health professional. Increasingly, our fire and rescue crews are being called upon to attend incidents involving people experiencing suicidal distress, and they are often the first on the scene. In those critical moments, having the right training can absolutely save someone’s life.

Figures show that suicide-related incidents attended by fire and rescue services in England rose from 1,119 in 2014 to 3,184 in 2024—and of course those are not just numbers; they represent people in desperate need of help. Yet there is still no mandatory, standardised suicide prevention training for firefighters. I have met many of the firefighters operating across my constituency, and they have reiterated to me time and again that they would absolutely welcome that training, if it were available to them as standard.

As the hon. Member for North Durham rightly pointed out, Samaritans has called for protected time for firefighters to undertake this training, following the Government’s announcement of similar provisions for some police officers. I would like reassurance from the Minister that this will be rolled out to firefighters. It should not be a provision made for the police, but not for firefighters; all emergency services should be offered this training. This cannot be left to individual fire and rescue authorities; it must be a direction coming from the centre.

With incidents rising so steeply over the 10 years from 2014 to 2024, as the data I referred to shows, we are in desperate need of a robust and consistent national approach. I therefore call on the Government to introduce mandatory, standardised suicide prevention training across all fire and rescue services, providing in-depth, in-person and practical skills and knowledge. We must also get over the siloed approach that naturally, but unfortunately, exists within Government between one Department and another. To reiterate, in Nicola’s case, the service provision that she was reaching out for would ultimately sit under the Department of Health and Social Care, but this debate is being answered by an MHCLG Minister. We must remove ourselves from that siloed thinking and do everything we can to ensure that when someone does reach out, the first response they receive is the right one. I urge the Government to commit today to making that happen.

14:04

[Marie Goldman (Chelmsford) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Efford. I thank the hon. Member for North Durham (Luke Akehurst) for securing this very important debate.

We have heard about some of the incredible, essential work that fire and rescue services do when responding to suicide call-outs. Often first on the scene, making life-or-death decisions in traumatic and dangerous situations that put their own safety at risk, firefighters deserve our utmost respect and support.

Since becoming an MP, it has been my pleasure to meet firefighters from my local fire and rescue service and their leadership in my constituency. As part of last year’s inaugural cohort of MPs taking part in the parliamentary knowledge scheme for frontline services, it was also a privilege to visit the London Fire Brigade station in Paddington, which is one of the busiest in London. I am always impressed by the work that firefighters are able to carry out, often in extreme conditions.

However, as we have heard, suicide-related call-outs to fire and rescue services have risen markedly. Since records began in England, they have more than tripled, with services attending 3,250 incidents in the year ending September 2025—about 62 every week. Indeed, other rescue services, such as the Royal National Lifeboat Institution and Mountain Rescue, also tell me that the biggest increase in their call-outs over the past few years has been to incidents involving self-harm or mental health more generally.

When that increase is added to more recent pressures on the fire service—be they budgetary pressures, such as fuel inflation, or the greater number of fire call-outs caused by increasingly hot summers due to the climate emergency—it is more important than ever that our fire and rescue services are better supported by the Government. That is why my Liberal Democrat colleagues and I believe that firefighters should have the training, skills and confidence that they need to respond safely and effectively when someone is experiencing a suicidal crisis.

It cannot be right that there is no consistent mandatory suicide prevention training across fire and rescue services in England, and that instead individual services are responsible for their own training. To guarantee any less is fair neither for a firefighter attending such a difficult and upsetting call-out, nor for a patient in need of help. The Liberal Democrats are calling for the Government to review introducing mandatory England-wide suicide prevention training for firefighters and to work with fire and rescue services, local authorities—we have a MHCLG Minister responding to the debate, and this is very relevant to his portfolio—and suicide prevention organisations.

As other Members mentioned, the Government have rightly introduced protected time for trauma and suicide prevention training for new police recruits. It must surely follow that firefighters, who often face many of the same situations as police officers, receive equivalent support. Although that would be a welcome step, it should form part of a wider workplace wellbeing safety net. Regular exposure to suicide and traumatic call-outs has serious impacts on firefighters and their mental health, with inevitable knock-on effects for retention in the service. My Liberal Democrat colleagues are therefore keen to ensure regular and comprehensive health screenings for firefighters throughout the whole of their careers—and, indeed, their retirement—so that no firefighter is left without help.

Sadly, suicide prevention training is one small part of a broader package of support that fire and rescue services need. I hope the Government will seriously consider our calls for greater suicide prevention training and endorse the clear cross-party sentiment that fire and rescue services—indeed, all rescue services—need to be recognised and supported, given the increasing workloads and pressures that they face.

14:11

[David Simmonds (Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Efford. I congratulate the hon. Member for North Durham (Luke Akehurst) on securing this debate, and it is a pleasure to be opposite the Minister. It is a tribute to his intellectual breadth that this morning I heard him on the “Today” programme talking about youth unemployment, and this afternoon he is here to talk about fire services and suicide training.

This is an issue that most of us, as constituency Members of Parliament, will hear about when we engage with our local fire services. When I visited the station in Pinner, it was one of a number of concerns that seemed to emerge from the experience of those fire crews and the changing nature of the call-outs. They said that the job used to be predominantly about rescuing people in emergencies and attending house fires, but that they increasingly have to deal with things such as motor crashes and crises when a person has called the emergency services, uncertain about the exact nature of what is going on and the firefighters are the responders summoned. They therefore find themselves dealing with an individual in a moment of crisis, perhaps facing a situation that is outside the normal breadth of their training; my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley and Ilkley (Robbie Moore) set out a powerful constituency example showing how important that is.

The Government need to consider carefully how to roll out an appropriate level of training. One issue, and also perhaps a learning opportunity, is the way that the whole range of our public services addresses emerging issues. On suicide prevention, social workers, police officers and workers in various parts of the NHS have a high degree of personal expertise and will have had high-quality training and the opportunity to make a good assessment, based on the evidence, of what works effectively to prepare those individuals for the situations that they may come across. We must avoid reinventing the wheel for fire service professionals, when we may be able to use the learning from effective programmes in place elsewhere to ensure that what is provided is focused and appropriate, and gives firefighters the skills they need when dealing with members of the public in a moment of crisis.

It is important in such a debate to remind ourselves about the risks, particularly when we are talking about mandatory training and what that involves. Those of us who have spent a long time in local government dealing with issues such as child sexual exploitation will be very conscious that when everything is a priority, nothing is a priority any more. Recent estimates on the new Oliver McGowan training in the NHS, which is designed to raise awareness and skill levels about people with learning disabilities and how they interact with the health service, describe a potential bill of as much as £1 billion for a day and a half of mandatory training for every single member of staff—3.7 million people across the NHS and social care. That will also have a service impact due to the unavailability of those staff to deal with patients because they are being abstracted to undertake that training.

I know that the Minister and the Government will quite rightly have in mind—and the Opposition support them in this—ensuring a proportionate approach and making sure that the people who are in the best position to help individuals going through that moment of crisis are the ones who get the most focused training, but that the general level of awareness across those organisations is raised to the right level.

[Marie Goldman]

The hon. Member is making an interesting point about proportionality of training. He mentions the cost of doing the training, but I have not heard anything about the subsequent impact on the NHS—for example, if people are in better mental health because they have been helped by somebody who has had training, what positive knock-on impact might that have on the NHS? Has he made any assessment of that?

[David Simmonds]

I think proportionality encompasses exactly that question—a question that our public health professionals and our public services have to address every single day, with every patient that they see and with every organisational review that they undertake: what is the cost, benefit and consequence of this, especially when it involves taking a member of staff away from dealing directly with someone who might be in a moment of crisis, to undertake training on a different subject? What is the overall impact, and how do we make sure that those resources are best used?

Quite rightly, the hon. Member for North Durham and other contributors focused mainly on the impact on the public—the fact that this is a public service and what it means to those people who may be in a moment of crisis. However, it is also valuable to remember the contributions that touched on the impact on the firefighters and public servants more broadly. I am very conscious, from the work that I did on the impact of child sexual exploitation that it was about both making sure that people understood the signs in children and in families, and the indicators of risk that meant intervention was required, and also understanding the cumulative impact of dealing with incredibly difficult issues on someone’s mental health and wellbeing, and on their ability to do a professional job to a high standard.

The hon. Member for North Durham very nicely encompassed this point and my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley and Ilkley touched on it as well: this is also about us, as employers of public servants, making sure that we exercise an appropriate duty of care for the people who are doing this incredibly difficult job on behalf of our society, and that they have the skills, tools and training that they need to cope with the things that that will require them to do.

14:18

[The Minister for Housing and Planning (Matthew Pennycook)]

It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Mr Efford. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for North Durham (Luke Akehurst) on securing this important debate, and I thank the other Members who have spoken. I thank the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner (David Simmonds), for his kind words; I was actually on the morning rounds speaking about service charge protections for leaseholders, but I was very glad to speak about youth unemployment and a variety of other topics as well.

Mr Efford, as will be evident to you, I am not the Minister for Homelessness, Democracy, Communities and Faith, who would ordinarily respond to a debate on this subject; my hon. Friend is currently taking the Building Safety (Remediation of Unsafe Cladding etc) Bill through its Committee stage, and so I am responding in her stead.

In the time I have available to me, I intend to provide some further clarity about the Government’s support for the fire and rescue services. Before I do, I make two general points. The first, as several hon. Members have alluded to, is that we should not lose sight of the people at the heart of this debate, namely individuals who have been lost to suicide or those whose suicidal feelings have led them to attempt to take their own lives. Every life lost to suicide is a tragedy, one that leaves a lasting impact on families, friends and communities. I join my hon. Friend the Member for North Durham in paying tribute to the work of the Samaritans. We value their expertise in suicide prevention and we take very seriously their concerns in this area.

Secondly, on behalf of the Government, I pay tribute to those firefighters, but also the control room staff and other emergency service personnel, who respond at some of the most difficult moments in people’s lives. The impacts of dealing with the situations that we have discussed this afternoon can stay with them long after an incident has ended, so it is vital that we support them with the skills and confidence they need to help people in crisis and to ensure their own wellbeing.

The data, as hon. Members have mentioned, is perfectly clear: firefighters are attending more suicide-related call-outs. In the year to March 2026, fire and rescue services in England attended 3,270 non-fire incidents involving suicide or attempted suicide. That is a 151% increase from 10 years ago. That trend reinforces the importance of firefighters being properly prepared and supported. But the attendance data does not tell us what training those firefighters receive, whether that training was adequate, why attendance has increased or how many individual firefighters have been exposed. The figures therefore provide a strong reason to examine current provision, but they do not demonstrate that existing training is inadequate or that mandatory training is the appropriate solution.

Our first step is to work with the sector to understand whether there are any material gaps in existing provision. We will seek the health and wellbeing task and finish group’s advice on current provision, and, taking account of that advice, consider with the National Fire Chiefs Council whether any further sector-led work is needed. If the evidence does identify material gaps, we will consider with the sector what further action would be appropriate. This could include the role of standards and inspection in providing greater assurance, but we do not want to pre-empt what the evidence tells us.

The important point to make clear is that any significant new national requirements, funding or assurance arrangements would require separate decisions, because further action will be informed by the evidence and what is practical and proportionate. I am glad the shadow Minister mentioned the need for proportionality. Our position is that work needs to be proportionate and predominantly sector-led unless the Government consciously decide to reprioritise resources. Responsibility for delivery is kept with fire and rescue authorities, while allowing the Government and sector partners to determine whether any further national or sector-led action is justified.

I want to make it clear, because this is the central point that my hon. Friend the Member for North Durham and others have put to me, that we are not ruling out mandatory national training in future. However, a nationally mandated requirement would represent a significant departure from the current approach. Fire and rescue authorities are responsible as employers for determining the training that their staff need, and the Government do not currently mandate individual training requirements. Our approach is generally, as I said, to support sector-led improvement, including through funding the National Fire Chiefs Council to target support where it is most needed. We do not currently have evidence that would justify making an exception to that approach for suicide prevention training.

In the Government’s view, the evidence does not demonstrate systemic failure across the sector or establish that mandation would be the most effective or proportionate response. However, given the increase in suicide-related incidents, stakeholder concerns and the policing commitment, there is good reason to work with the sector to understand whether there are material gaps in existing provision. As I said, if that work identifies significant and persistent gaps that cannot adequately be addressed through sector-led improvement, guidance or clearer expectations, we will consider what further action is justified by the evidence. But our immediate priority, as I have said, is to establish the evidence.

I should just make a point in terms of a comparison with the police because, as part of establishing the evidence base, we will draw on learnings from the police force. Police officers are being given protected time for trauma and suicide prevention training. Although there are important parallels between the services—firefighters and police officers can find themselves responding side by side to traumatic incidents—the policing commitment responds to the specific evidence and circumstances within policing, including geographical variation in workforce support and wider wellbeing pressures. The evidence of a particular problem in some police force training does not in itself demonstrate equivalent systemic gaps across fire and rescue services.

There is also existing support for the fire and rescue service, including the National Fire Chiefs Council’s suicide prevention and postvention toolkit, the development of which was supported through Government grant funding. The toolkit provides practical resources and pathways to support prevention, early intervention and postvention. We also recognise the important contribution of specialist organisations, including the Fire Fighters Charity and Samaritans. The Fire Fighters Charity provides dedicated suicide prevention resources and a 24-hour crisis line for the fire service community, which received more than 200 calls in its first year. Many services also work with Samaritans and other specialist organisations.

I will just say a little on improving existing training. Alongside our commitment to building the evidence base, the Government will also work closely with the sector to better understand best practice—there is good practice out there—and to identify where there might be material gaps in existing provision.

We will seek the advice of the cross-sector firefighter health and wellbeing task and finish group. Taking account of that advice, the Fire Minister—Baroness Blake of Leeds—will discuss with the National Fire Chiefs Council, the Local Government Association and other partners what further sector-led work is needed to identify and address material gaps. We will also engage with the Fire Standards Board and His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue Services to consider how standards and inspection can provide stronger assurance.

[Marie Goldman]

The Minister has said “sector-led” a few times in his response, which is important. However, it is my understanding that this training is essentially something that Samaritans is asking for, and who can say that Samaritans does not lead the sector when it comes to suicide prevention? I wonder what more he needs to see from the sector to suggest that providing this training would not be the right approach to adopt.

[Matthew Pennycook]

I have tried to convey that although we take very seriously the concerns of Samaritans—we will work with Samaritans and we are interested in its evidence—it is the Government’s assessment that we do not have the evidence base that would justify, at this moment in time, mandating national guidance in a way that would be a significant departure from the current approach. However, as I have also tried to make clear, we are not shutting down the option of mandating such guidance; we want to explore whether it is required.

I will say a little on cross-Government work, because the hon. Member for Keighley and Ilkley (Robbie Moore) mentioned it; I will ensure that colleagues in the Department of Health and Social Care register his concerns. The Government are addressing the impacts of work-related trauma more widely through our broader work on firefighter health and wellbeing. My Department and the Department of Health and Social Care are working jointly with the sector on prevention, early intervention and longer-term support. This includes development of a cross-sector firefighter health and wellbeing concord, research into occupational health risks, and work to develop an enhanced health monitoring offer, building on existing arrangements and tailored to the occupational risks that firefighters face. That matters because, as I have said, the effects of traumatic incidents do not necessarily end when the incident ends; they may emerge later, or build up over a career. The Government’s approach recognises both the skills that firefighters need to help members of the public in crisis, and—as I have also said—the support that they themselves need.

Finally, as the Government have already announced, we intend to launch the college of fire and rescue in 2029 to strengthen professional standards, skills and training across the sector. The Government will carefully consider what support we might provide as the college’s functions are finalised, and I will ensure that the specific point made by my hon. Friend the Member for North Durham is considered by the Fire Minister.

I again thank my hon. Friend for securing this debate and I thank hon. Members for contributing. Firefighters are being called to increasing numbers of these deeply difficult incidents. They need the skills and confidence to help people experiencing suicidal crisis, and they deserve support for the effect that such work might have on them. Although I have not been able to commit to mandating a particular national training model today, I hope that in my response to the debate I have been able to reassure hon. Members that the Government are not simply assuming that current provision is good enough. As I have made clear, we want to work with the sector to understand whether there are material gaps in existing provision and to determine what further action, if any, is needed.

As we do so, I know that the Fire Minister will be more than happy to keep my hon. Friend the Member for North Durham and other hon. Members updated, and I will make sure that she responds specifically to a number of the points that my hon. Friend made, not least regarding what engagement she has had as Fire Minister with the Fire Brigades Union.

14:28

[Luke Akehurst]

I thank everyone who has participated in what I think has been a useful debate, during which we have had the time to delve into a serious and important subject in quite some detail.

The hon. Member for Keighley and Ilkley (Robbie Moore) made the important point that the first responder on the scene is critical and that the training that they have received can save lives. He outlined the tragic case of his constituent’s daughter, and it was important for us to hear about what this issue means for the people who are directly affected by it.

I also thank my hon. Friend the Member for Blaydon and Consett (Liz Twist) and the hon. Member for Winchester (Dr Chambers), who have now left the Chamber, but who made important and useful interventions before they did so.

The Liberal Democrat spokesperson, the hon. Member for Chelmsford (Marie Goldman), made some very important points in support of the call by Samaritans for mandatory training, and very importantly she raised the issue of the support offered to firefighters compared with the support offered to the police.

The shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner (David Simmonds), talked about the changing nature of call-outs and the increased number that involve an individual in crisis. He made a very important point about learning from what is effective in training programmes in other sectors rather than reinventing the wheel. He also made the important point about a proportionate approach to the time taken up in training and the costs involved, along with raising the important issue of the duty of care to the firefighters.

I thank the Minister for his very detailed response to the debate and for paying tribute to Samaritans as an organisation and our firefighters. It was important that he mentioned the control room staff. After a meeting last Friday, I had the honour of being taken into the control room for County Durham and Darlington by the chief fire officer. It was the height of the firework season and very busy, and I saw the calm way that those people dealt with dramatic phone calls coming in short order. I think of the impact that working in that way every day must have on them.

The Minister mentioned the importance of the National Fire Chiefs Council for looking at any gaps in training as a sector. He also mentioned not pre-empting the evidence that comes back along with the need for it to be sector-led. I accept that point and welcome that he did not rule out—if the evidence shows that it is needed—responding positively to the call for a national mandated requirement. I look forward to hearing what evidence comes back from that survey and whether the gaps identified from talking to the fire chiefs match those identified in the desktop survey that Samaritans did through freedom of information requests. I take the Minister’s points about learning from the police experience but not seeing it as mapping completely across. His points about the potential role of the college of fire and rescue were also important.

I end by echoing what the Minister said about not assuming that current provision is good enough. Certainly, the research by Samaritans suggested that there is considerable postcode variation even between the fire brigades within an individual region. I am reassured by what the Minister said about properly going away and looking at the evidence and seeing if what Samaritans has asked for is indeed what is needed.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered the matter of suicide prevention training for fire and rescue services.

14:30

Sitting suspended.