Lease costs for South East Regional Control Centre announced

Lease costs for South East Regional Control Centre (SERCC) have been announced. The figures show that the South East Regional Emergency Fire Control has a 25 year lease costing £46 million. Breaking this down per annum is an annual cost of £1.84m. Dividing this figure down further to County level (for the nine counties for the RCC: Isle of Wight, Hampshire, Surrey, Oxfordshire, Buckinghamshire, West Sussex, East Sussex, Kent, Berkshire) means the cost per annum to the local tax payer will be £204,445. Additional figures that would have to be added to the above annual costs for the Regional Fire Control Centre (based in Fareham) would be £396,825 per annum (£44,091 for the Isle of Wight)…

Firefighters’ union condemns broken government pledge on regional control centres

THE FIRE BRIGADES UNION Firefighters’ union condemns broken government pledge on regional control centres The Fire Brigades Union today condemned the decision to renege on the pledge made by both coalition partners that they would scrap the previous government’s plan to create nine big regional control centres. Fire Minister Bob Neill announced yesterday that the government would honour the contracts to companies. It means replacing the present 46 control centres with nine big centres, operating new, complicated and untried technology. “This is a massively expensive way of making Britain less safe, and a shameless abandonment of a clear pledge given before the election by both governing parties” FBU general secretary Matt Wrack said today. “Firefighters…

Retained Firefighters: Pension Settlement Update

CIRCULAR: 2010HOC0317MW 07 May 2010 TO: ALL RETAINED BRANCHES Cc: Brigade Secretaries Dear Brother/Sister, RETAINED FIREFIGHTERS: PENSION SETTLEMENT UPDATE FBU officials and representatives of Thompsons Solicitors have been in negotiations with representatives of the Department of Communities and Local Government (CLG) trying to reach a negotiated settlement that could be recommended to members as a settlement to the issue of firefighters working the Retained Duty System gaining access to the Firefighters’ Pension Scheme. A report was given to the Executive Council at their meeting held on 21st and 22nd April 2010 and a full discussion took place on the negotiations to date. Regular reports have been given to the Executive Council and further meetings have…

FiReControl and recent Government Announcements

CIRCULAR: 2010HOC0348AD 26 May 2010 TO: ALL MEMBERS Dear Brother/Sister, FIRECONTROL AND RECENT GOVERNMENT ANNOUNCEMENTS Members will be aware of various reports issued by government departments at Westminster, which refer to the government’s consideration of the FiReControl Project and regionalisation more generally. Similarly, a number of members and officials have received what appears to be, positive assurances from their Member of Parliament. Whilst we all hope that common sense will prevail, at this time no definite decision has been made whether to proceed with the project as it stands; to delay the current project; to modify the project progress with an alternative; or of course, to cease the project entirely and to maintain the current…

Regionalisation of Emergency Fire Controls – Letter to Prime Minister David Cameron

CIRCULAR: 2010HOC0336MW 14 May 2010 TO: ALL MEMBERS Dear Brother / Sister REGIONALISATION OF EMERGENCY FIRE CONTROLS – LETTER TO PRIME MINISTER Members will be aware from our long running lobbying and campaigning that the Conservative and Liberal Democrat parties have both expressed very clear opposition to the Regionalisation of Fire Controls in England. The two parties now form the new Government. Attached is a letter to the Prime Minister seeking a commitment from the Government to honour the pledges made on this issue prior to the election; the text of the letter also appears below. Yours fraternally MATT WRACK GENERAL SECRETARY  Download the letter to the Prime Minister as a PDF Text of letter…

General Election and Regional Control Centre’s

On Thursday this week FBU members will be casting their votes in what’s being billed as one of the closest ever General Elections. Members will quite rightly be looking to vote for a party which will protect their own interests.  One subject which has been raised during debates on stations is the Conservative Partys pledge to “Scrap regional Control Centres where they have not gone live”.  This has been quoted by all Conservative MP’s in response to FBU members written concerns, including by David Cameron. This has given members a clear ‘local’ (single) reason for choosing a political party to vote for.  However the regional office is in possession of  a letter from Stewart Jackson MP, the…

FiReControl just keeps on delivering…disappointment

After the latest condemnation of FiReControl from an influential committee, the Fire Brigades Union’s Sharon Riley, executive council member representing fire controls, tells Mike Lowe why FiReControl is such a bad idea and how easy it is to do it better The FBU’s Sharon Riley didn’t know where to start when I asked her what was actually wrong with FiReControl – the government’s plan to modernise Fire Service technology. She explains: “It was never something that they consulted upon. It’s something which ministers and civil servants embarked upon without first consulting fire services or the professionals working in fire controls. So it’s a government driven project, top-down, with very little understanding of what it is…

Public Safety Fiasco FiReControl

999 centres under fire A project to build two regional control centres to answer 999 fire calls from across the south has been poorly executed and badly managed. The Communities and Local Government Select Committee warned that the future of an efficient system for the fire service had been put at “substantial risk”. 46 fire control rooms in England will be replaced with nine new regional centres which the government says will  provide a more robust service. Emergency calls from Dorset will be answered in Taunton and calls from Hampshire, Isle of Wight and West Sussex will be answered in Fareham. The MPs said that given the investment of public funds already committed, and the benefits that…

Call to Scrap Regional Fire Controls

Call to scrap regional fire plans The Fire Brigade Union (FBU) for the South East has called on the government to scrap plans for regional fire centres after criticism from MPs. The select committee said the project to replace control rooms put the future of an efficient fire service system at “substantial risk”. A centre in Hampshire will cover Kent, Buckinghamshire, Berkshire, Isle of Wight, Surrey, Sussex and Oxfordshire. The government said the centres would cut costs and improve response times. The communities and local government committee said the programme to replace fire control rooms has been “poorly executed and badly managed” but said it should still go ahead. Paul Watts, regional FBU officer, said:…

Select Committee report Shows FiReControl Project should be abandoned

The Government cannot meet the Select Committee’s six conditions for continuing with FireControl, says Fire Brigades Union general secretary Matt Wrack. Mr Wrack said: “The Select Committee Report on the government’s FireControl project supports our long-held view that public money is being wasted and public safety compromised. The Select Committee sets out six conditions for the continuance of the project, and in our view these conditions cannot be met, so the project must be abandoned. We recognise that this will mean that public money has been wasted, but to continue with the project means throwing good money after bad. “The Select Committee’s view that “the project has been beset by a lack of openness and…