Oral Answers to Questions

Baroness Hoey Excerpts

Wednesday 21st November 2012 Commons Chamber

[Kate Hoey (Vauxhall) (Lab)]

Q13. The Prime Minister quite rightly praised the wonderful work of London’s emergency services during the Olympics, Paralympics and Her Majesty’s jubilee. Does he share the concern of the London public about the number of fire stations that are threatened with closure, in particular the one in Clapham Old Town in my constituency? Will he join the campaign to save that fire station, and does he agree that it is not right to choose a fire station for closure simply because it is on very expensive land?

[The Prime Minister]

Obviously this is an issue for the Mayor as well as for the Government, but I will look closely at what the hon. Lady has said. Hon. Members must recognise that the most important thing is the time it takes the emergency services to get to an incident. As constituency MPs, we are naturally focused on the bricks and mortar items—whether ambulance or fire stations, or other facilities—but what really matters for our constituents is how quickly the emergency services get to them and how good the service is when they do so.