Fire Services (Hertfordshire)

I, too, congratulate the hon. Member for St. Albans (Anne Main) on securing the debate, which is timely, given the recent national lobby. Fire services throughout the country will be listening carefully to the Minister’s response, because the issues that have been raised have wider implications and do not affect Hertfordshire only. The debate is also timely because, as I realised when travelling through King’s Cross, we are close to the anniversary of the King’s Cross fire, which resulted in severe loss of life many years ago and in significant changes to equipment and fire safety. Basically, the problem in Hertfordshire boils down to two things. First, as contributors to the debate have made clear, Hertfordshire county council is under significant financial pressure. The financial outlook, as we heard yesterday, does not look particularly rosy. Local authorities all over the country will be concerned about how their settlement is going to affect their ability to meet ever-rising cost pressures. The system of local government funding makes it difficult for local authorities to deal with their funding pressures, because the bulk of their expenditure is on staff costs, which increase above the rate of inflation. Exactly the same is true with the fire service, and I know from my constituency that there are great pressures on it. Much of that pressure owes to the fact that 80 per cent. of its budget is for staffing costs. It is therefore difficult to make the cut anywhere other than on the front line, which in key emergency services such as the fire service is of great concern. We know from local news and council reports that the pressures have already resulted in cuts to services, but there has been great progress on, for example, fire service call-outs, which have dropped by 7.5 per cent., and smaller fires, which have fallen by 21 per cent., notwithstanding the small fire in the home of the hon. Member for North-East Hertfordshire (Mr. Heald). Clearly, that is a response to the emphasis that has been placed on fire prevention. I have visited my local fire station several times and spent time on the doorstep with firefighters to push the safety programme forward. I saw at first hand the impact that they can have, as well as a number of homes that did not have smoke alarms, for example.