Policing and Crime Bill — House of Commons, 2016-04-26
Topic: Mixed Topics
Lyn Carol Brown (Labour, Centre-left): But should a PCC take over the fire service, we would have a person in charge whose main attention was on policing and all that policing involved. The media focus much more on policing than they do on the fire service. The fire service will be secondary. Although the Minister rightly says—I do not doubt him—that the two funding streams will be different, I do not know how long that will last, and in truth, neither does he, because things move on. We had police and crime commissioners under the last Government; this Government are now proposing police, crime and fire commissioners. What will happen in a couple of years’ time? I do not know. There might be accounting efficiencies in order to save costs, and the budgets might well be merged. I do not think that these proposals make any sense A further risk is that these proposals will make mergers of fire services more difficult, which would be a real setback, as inter-fire mergers increase resilience and achieve significant savings. The 2007 merger of the Devon and Somerset fire services was supposed to deliver £3 million of savings in the first five years. It actually bettered that target by £600,000 The Minister will know that Martyn Underhill, the Independent PCC for Dorset—I am trying to keep this politically neutral—has said that he has no interest in running the fire service. Why? It is because Dorset and Wiltshire fire service has undergone a merger that proposes to bring significant savings and increase the resilience in that area. He does not want to interfere with the process, and he is really wary about his office having responsibility for Wiltshire. I admire this decision, made by Commissioner Underhill, but how many potential mergers of fire services will not even be considered as a result of PCC takeovers and the need for coterminosity? I remind the Minister that until a few months ago, this Government trumpeted mergers as a key to the future of the fire service; yet they are now, sadly, going to slip off the agenda I know that the Minister has little sympathy with the particular argument I am about to make, but I am a brave soul. A large proportion of the work carried out by the fire service is preventive. There is a danger that these proposals will make this preventive work a little more difficult. It is a humanitarian service. We need to be honest: the police service is not a humanitarian service. The two services are seen differently by some communities, and these proposals could make the fire service’s preventive work more difficult. There are some people who would not welcome a policeman into their home without a warrant. Police officers turning up at the door can be a scary experience. Firefighters go into people’s homes and work spaces, and check that smoke alarms and electrical appliances are safe. They fit sprinklers and even look for worrying signs that might concern other services, such as the NHS and council care services. This preventive work is not an add-on to the fire service’s work; it is at the core of what it does—keeping people safe, so that they do not have to be rescued further down the line.