Oral Answers to Questions

Liz Twist Excerpts

Monday 4th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

Perhaps it is worth my reminding the hon. Gentleman that at the last election he stood on a manifesto that wanted to cut police funding by 5% to 10%, whereas this Government have protected it. If his correlation were correct—if it were correct—crime would have gone up even more had Labour been in office.

[Liz Twist (Blaydon) (Lab)]

9. What steps his Department is taking in response to fire services’ ageing workforces.

[Grahame Morris (Easington) (Lab)]

12. What steps his Department is taking in response to fire services’ ageing workforces.

[The Minister for Policing and the Fire Service (Mr Nick Hurd)]

The statutory fire and rescue national framework includes principles that all services should follow to ensure that firefighters remain fit and fully supported to remain on operational duties and in employment.

[Liz Twist]

Fire and rescue services attended 574,659 incidents in the year to June 2017, an increase on the previous year. Has the Minister made any effort to ensure that the falling number of firefighters and fire stations are not overstretched?

[Mr Hurd]

Yes, because we believe the fire system has the resources it needs to do the job against a backdrop of falling demand for statutory fire services. Of course, the system is sitting on over £600 million of reserves, which have grown by over £0.25 billion since 2011.