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11
Oct
Fire service in discussions over on-call overnight Harrogate firefighters
North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service is in discussions with trade unions over on-call firefighters in Harrogate amid planned cuts to the number of overnight fire engines.
Jonathan Dyson, chief fire officer at the fire service, told a police, fire and crime panel that it was consulting on a staffing model for one of the engines at the station.
It comes as previous Conservative police, fire and crime commissioner, Zoe Metcalfe, approved plans in 2022 to cut the number of overnight engines in Harrogate from two to one as part of her Risk and Resource Model.
As part of the plan, which was due to be implemented in April this year, one fire engine would respond to all callouts 24 hours a day but the second would not be staffed between 10pm and 9am.
At the time, Ms Metcalfe said more fires occur during daytime, and having two fire engines at Harrogate would provide better daytime protection at key times.
However, the changes proved controversial and have yet to be implemented due to extended consultation with staff.
Jonathan Dyson, chief fire officer at North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue.
At yesterday's meeting in York, Cllr Chris Aldred, a Liberal Democrat who represents High Harrogate and Kingsley on North Yorkshire Council, asked Mr Dyson why the changes have been delayed.
Mr Dyson said:
We presented our findings to the trade unions in September of last year. We are still awaiting from them a formal report back on an offer. Now, after discussions with staff, they put forward some time ago an initial different option which is day-crewed as opposed to day-staffed.
We consulted on a 24-hour available appliance and the second appliance was going to be available 12 hours a day. In the grey book, which is what all this works around, there is another duty system which allows them to work like at Malton and Selby where they are on-call at night.
We are in discussions with staff to see if this is a viable model from a financial perspective as well before we have to move any further on. We are awaiting a response from the staff and trade unions before we move to implement. I’m confident that we can have an agreement before the end of the year, then we would move to implementation.
When asked by Cllr Aldred if this means the second nighttime appliance would be retained at the station, Mr Dyson said:
It depends on where we reach agreement with the trade unions.
The Fire Brigades Union previously warned that the changes at Harrogate would lead to “second-rate emergency response service that will put lives at risk”.
Jo Coles, Labour's deputy mayor for policing, fire and crime, who replaced Ms Metcalfe and took on the former commissioner’s powers, told the Stray Ferret in July that she was prepared to meet firefighter unions over concerns at North Yorkshire’s fire service.
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