Matt Wrack, the general secretary of the Fire Brigades Union, has written to Rachel Reeves ahead of Labour’s first budget, to call for urgent funding for the fire and rescue service.
While welcoming Labour’s workers’ rights package, the union warned that this approach “must be reflected in funding for pay offers in the public sector workers to avoid disputes similar to that faced by the fire service in early 2023.”
In the letter, Wrack said: “Low wages, crumbling infrastructure and inadequate public services are not just a blight on the lives of working people. They are also a threat to public safety.
“Fire and rescue service response times are worse than ever before in recent history. It now takes more than nine minutes for a first appliance to reach a fire, significantly longer than it did thirty years ago.”
Labour has already promised to re-establish national standards in the fire service but, Wrack warns, funding will be crucial: “we cannot deliver a resilient, joined-up fire service that is fit for the future without investment. Under the Tories, the fire service lost 30% of its central government funding in cash terms.
“Now, as the Labour Chancellor, you can deliver a Budget that marks the end of the catastrophic 'austerity era'. The Labour government's Budget must begin to make up for the decade and a half of constant cuts to services and wages that have left many firefighters and other workers struggling to make ends meet.”
ENDS
1. The full text of the letter can be found here.
2. For more information and broadcast bids please email [email protected] and or call/text 07561896809
