Fire and Rescue Services

Mark Prisk Excerpts

Wednesday 5th September 2012 Westminster Hall

[Bridget Phillipson (Houghton and Sunderland South) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Bayley, for what I believe is the first time. I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Wentworth and Dearne (John Healey) for all his work to build a cross-party consensus on this issue, particularly on the impact of funding cuts on metropolitan authorities.

It is clear from the number of right hon. and hon. Members in the Chamber that there is considerable concern about the impact of cuts to fire and rescue services, and their effect on the services’ ability to protect the communities they serve. I pay tribute to firefighters in Tyne and Wear and across the country who take risks every day on our behalf. Sadly, firefighters can too often be injured or even killed in the line of duty. We owe it to those brave men and women, and the public they protect, to ensure that they have all the resources and support that they need to do their job properly.

I welcome the Minister to the Chamber, although I am not sure whether he will have responsibility for the fire service—I am trying to keep up with all the reshuffle business. I hope that he will approach the debate with an open mind and consider the arguments that are made. Those arguments have been set out strongly over the past two years, and they will continue to be made about the settlement for 2013 to 2015.

[The Minister for Housing (Mr Mark Prisk)]

I appreciate that this is not the custom, Mr Bayley, but I thank the hon. Lady for that. The attitude she suggests has always been my general approach as a Minister. I am fresh in the job—dare I say it, I am firefighting the debate. Perhaps I may put my point in the form of a question and ask her to understand that I would hope to continue to approach the matter in the manner in which my hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill) did.

[Bridget Phillipson]

I am glad to hear that the Minister will deal with the matter in that way and continue the cross-party work that has been done to try to resolve something that is in the interest of all our constituents.

I call on the Minister to implement a fairer funding settlement for fire and rescue services in the period 2013 to 2015. I ask him to listen to the arguments and to do the right thing for the service, for the firefighters who put their lives on the line for us, and for the public who depend on the risks they take.

In the first two years of the period covered by the comprehensive spending review, formula grant funding for fire and rescue services nationally decreased by about 6.5%, but Tyne and Wear had a cash cut of twice the national average. Many hon. Members have questioned whether the cuts were made fairly and equitably.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister for Housing (Mr Mark Prisk)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Houghton and Sunderland South (Bridget Phillipson) on securing the debate and for starting it on a reasonably non-partisan basis, although there will always be party political differences. Her representations in this timely debate were important. I have recently met firefighters in my own area, and I put on the record my strong support for what they do. It is only when meeting individual firefighters that one understands not only the nature of the challenge that they take on, but how it is changing. That is an important aspect of any consideration by Government.

I pay tribute to my predecessor, my hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill). I might have previously referred to the wrong constituency, although he may be happy with that; I do not know what the boundary might be. His view has been that we must listen and engage, and that is certainly the view of this Department. Whether I continue to hold this role once the Government reshuffle is settled, that would be my approach to this or any other matter.

I welcome the right hon. Member for Wentworth and Dearne (John Healey) saying that hon. Members are here to help. This is a difficult issue and, as we have heard, it has impacted and will continue to impact in different ways in different types of authorities. Inevitably, decisions will not satisfy all. I understand that.

Hon. Members have raised crucial issues. I shall try to respond to the broad issue of fire funding and will mention the background, in terms of fire safety and practice, and some issues to do with metropolitan areas and others as well. Any consultation—one is in hand at the moment—must consider how the Government’s actions impact in every area. Inevitably, as we have heard in relation to whether flat rate does or does not help, there will be a difference of opinion and that has been reflected in the representations received by my predecessor.

Fire and rescue authorities deliver an important service for their local community, which varies from a full-time, retained service to other kinds of service. The Government have made a clear commitment to ensuring the effectiveness of front-line services, despite the need to tackle the substantial deficit, which was, as the hon. Member for Birmingham, Yardley (John Hemming) mentioned, inherited from the previous Administration. Fire and rescue—a front-line emergency service—has been given funding protection, with reductions back-loaded to try to give those authorities more time in which to make sustained savings. Of course, within that spending framework—right hon. and hon. Members have mentioned this—operational decisions about fire stations and so on must be, should be and are best assessed locally. It is for each authority to understand their own operational priorities and use the integrated risk management plan as the basis on which they make those assessments. We should not forget that those plans are open to local consultation. It is right that a community is able to participate when decisions are made that affect it.

Several hon. Members, including the hon. Member for Sheffield Central (Paul Blomfield) and others, said that the background to this issue is, thankfully, positive, in the sense that the number of injuries and fatalities is decreasing. I pay tribute to the efforts of fire and rescue authorities in this regard. The impact of the Fire Kills campaign and changes in technology, which several hon. Members mentioned, mean that accidental fire deaths in the home have gone down by 40% in the past 10 years. We can all welcome that.

In 2001-02, there were 310 accidental fire deaths in the home, compared with 187 deaths in 2011-12, according to the latest fire statistics. Clearly, neither I nor any member of the Government would regard 187 deaths as acceptable in any sense, but that trend and the substance of that change is important, and, as with any public service, it must be reflected in how the service is provided. All hon. Members must respect the fact that the figures show good progress.

Hon. Members and those who have lobbied them will wish to understand where the Government are going in terms of funding. We have set out proposals for a fundamentally new approach to the funding of local government, which provides a direct financial reward to local authorities for delivering growth in their area. We intend to introduce these new arrangements from April next year. On 17 July, we published a technical consultation on the details of our proposals. That relates to several points raised by hon. Members.

The consultation proposes that single-purpose fire and rescue authorities should receive 2% of the local share of business rates. That will ensure that fire and rescue authorities will be top-up authorities and, as such, will have the confidence of having a significant proportion of their funding protected and their top-up payments being uprated annually on the basis of the retail prices index. The consultation also sets out issues concerning the transition from the current formula grant system to the implementation of business rates retention and looks at setting up and operation of the business rates retention scheme.

The right hon. Member for Wentworth and Dearne mentioned making fire and rescue services comparable with police authorities. I am new to this, but I understand that there is a quite a difference of opinion and that some authorities are in favour but others are not. During the consultation we will not rule out any possible option. However, I take the right hon. Gentleman’s point and will ensure that that is reflected on carefully, whether I am dealing with the matter or another Minister is doing so.

I am sure that hon. Members understand that the consultation runs until 24 September. We want to encourage representations. I want to ensure that representations are full and cover each and every type of fire authority.

Let me mention local funding decisions before dealing with a couple of specific points raised by hon. Members. We believe that there is further scope to drive out waste and inefficiency with properly planned measures. The hon. Member for Houghton and Sunderland South mentioned that changes have been made in the fire authority in Tyne and Wear: savings of £9 million have already been achieved. That fire authority has also targeted future savings of £15.84 million through integrated risk management and delegated budgets.

It is important to bear in mind that, in the light of declining incidences of fire and other incidents, authorities will naturally want, as any other public body would, to revisit their plans, which will in some cases have been made up to 10 years ago. We understand that. There is a challenge here and a difficult choice to make.

The hon. Member for Derby North (Chris Williamson) spoke passionately on behalf of the Opposition. I do not think—perhaps the hon. Member for Birmingham, Yardley differs—that we got an answer from the Opposition about whether they support further cuts. All parties in the House need to step up to the plate in that regard, because people are watching and will want to know where the Labour party stands. It is important that we get some clarity.

I welcome the remarks made by hon. Members from all parties about this being a difficult issue. We need to re-address how the funding is progressing.

Let me talk briefly about the metropolitan authorities and then answer some questions. It is important to recognise that, under the current system, those authorities receive far more protection under the existing damping financial system than any other type of authority. For example, Tyne and Wear fire and rescue authority benefits from damping of £6.25 million from 2011 to 2013. In the metropolitans as a whole, there is a damping benefit of roughly £26 million.

Some hon. Members have rightly said that substantial urban areas face different issues. We recognise that, which is why we have changed an element of the formula, which we inherited, to increase the relative needs weighting, which operates to the benefit of metropolitan authorities, because it reflects more of the needs that arise in urban areas. We understand that point.

[Joan Walley]

Will the Minister give way?

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[Mr Prisk]

I want to answer a couple of points raised in the debate.

There were two specific questions. First, on response times, we do not try to set a national target—rural and urban areas have different needs—and we must be careful not to go down that path.

Secondly, the right hon. Member for Coventry North East (Mr Ainsworth) mentioned charging. I will write to him, because time is short, with specifics about why that matters. The context is that, thankfully, the number of incidents and fatalities is declining. We need to ensure that reconfiguration of this service is done appropriately. We will listen carefully to further representations until the consultation closes on 24 September.