CUTS of 25 per cent of the fire service budget would be a “catastrophe” for Essex, the fire chief has warned.

David Johnson, Chief Fire Officer for Essex County Fire and Rescue Service, was speaking ahead of today’s Government cuts.

The service is facing a cut of between five and 25 per cent from its £76million budget.

Mr Johnson said he hoped there will be no redundancies if cuts are in the region of £8million to £12million, but warned if the cuts are at the higher end of the scale, then jobs would have to go.

“The big problem is no one knows how big the cuts are going to be,” he admitted.

“If it is closer to 25 per cent it will be a catastrophe. Some 70 per cent of out budget is made up from staff costs.”

There are 1,500 uniformed staff working for the service and 250 backroom staff.

He called on the Fire Brigades Union to work with the service and warned that it is not as simple as cutting the backroom staff.

It also includes essential jobs such as 20 highly-qualified mechanics in the fleet workshop, who maintain more than 100 fire vehicles, as well as six workers who maintain hydrants across the county.

He added that the human resources department is one of the most efficient in the country, and no one in the department is surplus to requirements.

“It is not for me to comment on how the credit crises happened, but it is my job to get the service through it,” Mr Johnson continued.

“I accept the fact the Government has to cut the deficit and everyone has to share the burden.

“But the key to getting through this is working with our workforce to decide what we want to keep.

“We have been working very hard lobbying ministers and MPs to make them understand that we think the fire service is a slightly different case than other areas of the public sector.

“Most areas are driven by demand, including the police, which is driven by levels of crime, but the fire service is based on risk.

“We are here in case things go wrong rather than how many times they go wrong.”

He said the Communities and Local Government department, which oversees the functions of fire service, will hear how much it will have to cut from its budget today and that fire services are expected to learn how much they will have to save in the following days.