Fire and Rescue Services

Bob Ainsworth Excerpts

Wednesday 5th September 2012 Westminster Hall

[John Hemming]

I was referring to Members from metropolitan areas. We do not have many Government Members from metropolitan areas, but a lot of them have turned up, while many who are not here are also concerned about this issue.

Obviously, we disagree with some of the things said by the hon. Member for Houghton and Sunderland South. The reality is that we are in a very difficult financial position. I refer the hon. Lady, who hopes that we can spend our way out of recession, to Sir James Callaghan’s speech in 1976 in which he basically said that that was not possible. We face the challenge of how to deal with a reducing budget nationally in an equitable and acceptable manner. My personal view is that, because of various constraints, we are going to face austerity for some time beyond the next general election and possibly into the 2020s. It is therefore very important that whatever mechanism is used to distribute funding across the country is equitable.

Local government funding—in many ways, fire and rescue is part of that—has been referred to as being like the Schleswig-Holstein question as it is very difficult to understand. It was perceived as unjust that, under this complex formula, certain areas of the country had much greater cuts than others. It is a complex formula, so it is difficult to see the equity in that result. When there are places, such as in the metropolitan areas, that are much more dependent on grant funding, the cuts in grant funding will impact much more on the total budget of some organisations than on those of others.

In meetings with the Minister’s predecessor, we asked him to ensure that fire and rescue service officers in the mets had direct contact with civil servants in the Department for Communities and Local Government, so that the operation of the formula was transparent. In some circumstances, there should be a floors-and-ceilings type of approach to avoid a situation in which some authorities get more money and others get less. That would obviously be difficult, because there are changes in demand—some areas will see much higher growth in the number of people living there than other areas, and consequently have greater demand.

The essence of the situation is that the funding conclusion is perceived by both Government and Opposition Back Benchers to be unfair. When the budget is constrained, that relates both to prevention and to incident responses. We all pay tribute to the excellent work done by firefighters throughout the country in protecting our constituents but, at the end of the day, there has to be a long-term solution that is seen as equitable across the country. That is the challenge for the Government, as it will be for future Governments. When there are no more goodies to share out, but there are constrained circumstances, it is a nil-sum game in which increasing spending in one area means having to reduce spending in another; that is the difficulty.

[Mr Bob Ainsworth (Coventry North East) (Lab)]

I agree, as will some of my hon. Friends, with part of what the hon. Gentleman is saying, but does he really believe that the fact that so few Government Members represent metropolitan areas is unrelated to the outcome, which is that those areas are facing the biggest cuts?

[John Hemming]

No, I do not believe that. We have a complex formula into which figures have been slotted and an outcome has emerged. That is not the cause. My argument was that, given the relatively small number of Members who represent metropolitan constituencies, a large proportion of such Members in the Chamber today are Government Members. That demonstrates that concern about the formula—my hon. Friend the Member for Solihull (Lorely Burt), who could not be here today, is equally concerned about this—exists among both Opposition and Government Back Benchers. Obviously, the Minister has just been chucked into this and cannot give us any major assurances now, but what is critical is that the long term has to be far more transparent and far more equitable.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Bob Ainsworth (Coventry North East) (Lab)]

I am grateful to you, Mr Bayley, for the opportunity to speak.

Were the West Midlands fire service considered to be a fat and flabby public service, the Minister would have some justification for ignoring the things that it says or the position that it faces. In his response to the debate, will he say whether he believes that that is the situation with regard to the West Midlands fire service?

The West Midlands fire service has been at the forefront of some of the recent efficiencies and reforms, which some of my right hon. and hon. Friends have discussed in relation to their own areas. In the first 10 years of this century, the West Midlands fire service cut its fire officer numbers from 2,043 to 1,788, while maintaining a service—it has struggled to do so, but it has maintained it—of which all of us in the west midlands are proud and respectful. It has also managed to transfer resources to prevention work, which right hon. and hon. Friends have also discussed in relation to their own areas. The West Midlands fire service is not a fat and flabby organisation; it is an organisation that is doing its level best to be efficient and to provide a service, and that has faced considerable cuts already.

So far, under the formula grant imposed by the Government, the West Midlands fire service has faced a 12.6% cut. Our own chief fire officer, who is not prone to scaremongering, has said that if the Government continue with that formula,

“People will definitely be much more at risk and our ability to respond in the way we currently do will be severely disrupted, so therefore an increased chance of losing their life or suffering injury.”

Those are his words, not mine, and he believes that if the current formula continues he will have to get rid of another 300 fire officers, on top of the 300 he has lost in the past decade, and he will also have to close 11 fire stations. He also says—these are his words, and I know that some of my right hon. and hon. Friends disagree with this view—that he would like to see the flat rate formula apply rather than the grossly unfair formula that is currently planned. If we went to a flat rate formula, we would still face a reduction in funding in the west midlands, but not the 27% reduction that we potentially face if the current formula continues in the future.

I do not want to repeat things that other Members have said, given the severe time constraints that exist. However, I want to raise one other issue with the Minister. The chief fire officer has also said that he will inevitably have to introduce charges for call-outs in non-life-threatening situations. In some ways, I can see the attraction of that, but I really worry about it because I do not know where, down the spectrum of responses, people should be subjected to a charge, and I do not think that members of the public would either. Let us say that some youths light a bonfire over the fields. If a member of the public calls out the fire service, should they expect to be charged? We are talking about £412 an hour, potentially. If the youths then start throwing dustbins on to the fire, should the member of the public then feel free to phone the fire brigade without risk of a charge? At what point, as the incident escalates, would a member of the public feel safe to call the fire brigade without the risk of being charged?

I want the Minister to talk to me, and to respond to the issue of the potential introduction of charges for call-outs in non-life-threatening situations. That is the severity of the situation that is faced by the West Midlands fire service and, I am certain, by others as well.

[Mr Shaun Woodward (St Helens South and Whiston) (Lab)]

We are in no doubt that the implication of the settlement being prosecuted will be an extremely unfair distribution of lives lost. The new Minister will today, undoubtedly, be given a file basically dressed up as “Minister, this is a difficult settlement. It is one that has basically been taken. Go forward with it. We have no choice.” Knowing that the settlement, if implemented, will lead to loss of life, what advice would my right hon. Friend give to the Minister, and his civil servants, given his own extraordinary experience as a Minister and a member of the Cabinet?

[Mr Ainsworth]

I think that the Minister will struggle to square off the different things that Ministers have said and done. They have said that we are all in it together, yet they have imposed the kind of cuts that we have seen in the west midlands and elsewhere. At the same time, the fire service in Cheshire, where the Chancellor has his seat, has seen its funding increased. There is no way that the rhetoric can stand, and the Minister must address the situation and be able to justify his decisions.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—