8:20am Tuesday 16th June 2009
FIREFIGHTERS have given their bosses ten days to shelve plans to shake up frontline services in the county.
Essex crews warned yesterday they would be balloting for industrial action on June 25 if their concerns about the plans were not addressed.
The Fire Brigades Union has accused the Essex Fire Authority of targeting frontline fire crews for cuts, rather than looking for genuine efficiency savings. The FBU claims the fire authority wants to finesse firefighter numbers to effectively cut the number of active staff.
They would go down from 954 in December 2008, to an average of 940 during 2008/9, 920 in 2009/10, and 905 in March 2010.
The result would spread firefighters more thinly across Essex, leaving too few to crew all the county’s fire appliances, union officials claim.
Paul Adams, Essex FBU brigade secretary, said: “We understand the need to look at making efficiency savings, but the frontline 999 emergency response is being cut back while headquarters managers and bureaucrats have been increasing.
“Firefighters can’t crew two fire engines at the same time and we can’t respond to two 999 calls at the same time.”
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