While Boris is cheered, our fire services are up in flames


by Sunny Hundal    
11:30 am - September 13th 2012

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While London Mayor Boris Johnson is being cheered over the Olympics and boosted in the polls, London’s Fire Brigade is being cut and dismantled.

The London Fire & Emergency Planning Authority (LFEPA) has had its budget cut by £29.5million next year and by a further £35.3million the year after. In total: £65 million.

With the cost of operating a fire station with one fire appliance at £1.4m per year, this means 15 fire stations and appliances are at risk of closure. Up to 25 next year could close next year.

For context, there are just 112 fire stations in London. In just over a year 35% of London’s stations could be shut down.

Labour’s City Hall Fire spokesperson, Navin Shah, sent out a statement this week saying:

The mayor needs to come clean on fire brigade cuts. This isn’t just an academic debate about numbers, if there aren’t enough fire engines in London then they will not get to incidents on time. As we all know time is a crucial factor in saving people’s lives.

It is disgusting that the mayor and government are making these cuts.

So far, the Conservatives are refusing to elaborate much on what they would close. Mayor Boris Johnson previously ruled out frontline cuts to fire services, but will now u-turn on his promise.

The London Evening Standard has barely covered the issue, but broadly remained painfully silent.

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About the author
Sunny Hundal is editor of LC. Also: on Twitter, at Pickled Politics and Guardian CIF.
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Reader comments


1. margin4error

I assume ruling out frontline cuts (so no cuts to numbers of firemen and their machines) is a bit like ruling out frontline cuts to policing (so not cuts to numbers of coppers and their kit)?

And by that I mean an obvious lie believed only by idiots and pretend-believed by government supporters.

2. kris

Have you see the video of Jenny Jones eviscerating Boris and the Tory myth of the “backroom police”?

http://bit.ly/OEl0VW

Who do they think are going to do these jobs?

Oh wait.

G4S/Serco

3. margin4error

kris

worse than g4s and serco – the sacking of admin staff means the admin (which is quite important since stuff needs to be properly documented to be admissable in court) ends up all having to be logged by coppers.

So we have a choice – coppers staying at the station instead of getting out among the public – or our policing run by outsourcing companies that have proved so recently to be utterly inept and massively over-priced.

If only a party could come forward from decades gone by and suggest an alternative that might work…

4. londonj

Strange the article does no reference the £500 million John Prescott blew on his pointless fire-control vanity project.

5. Jack C

Londonj,
Had you concentrated on your Ladybird books, you would know that “two wrongs don’t make a right”, and that “does no reference” should be “makes no reference”.

You sir, are a muddled oaf.

6. margin4error

LondonJ

It also makes no reference to the black death, the Beatles’ hit single ‘All You Need is Love’, or the England game last night.

Fancy listing lots of other stuff not mentioned in the article? My nan’s not in there. Nor is Bob Geldoff.


Reactions: Twitter, blogs
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  17. Gemma Tumelty

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  18. Lance Dyer

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  23. Tristram Wyatt

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  29. Alex Braithwaite

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  30. Droitwich Labour

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  32. GLA Labour

    http://t.co/AeYv3FqD How funding cuts could affect the London fire brigade





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