Call for answers over North Yorkshire fire service rising response times

Harrogate and Knaresborough Liberal Democrats have called for answers over rising response times at North Yorkshire’s fire service.

A meeting of North Yorkshire’s police, fire and crime panel last week was told that people had to wait for an average of 13 minutes and nine seconds for firefighters to respond to incidents.

This compared with 11 minutes and 37 seconds the year before.

Tom Gordon, Liberal Democrat parliamentary candidate for Harrogate and Knaresborough, described the figures as “worrying”.

He called on Zoe Metcalfe, Conservative North Yorkshire Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner, to explain the rise in the service’s response times.

Mr Gordon said:

“Local residents I speak to are deeply worried. According to the latest figures, people in the areas covered by the North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service had to wait an average of 13 minutes and nine seconds for firefighters to respond to incidents. This is an increase from 11 minutes and 37 seconds the previous year. It’s clear that something is amiss, and the people of North Yorkshire deserve to know why their safety is being put at risk.

“One cannot help but wonder if these rising response times are a direct result of budget cuts or resource allocation decisions. It’s essential that Commissioner Metcalfe provides a transparent and comprehensive explanation for these delays.

“If budget constraints or ill-advised resource changes are indeed contributing to slower response times, it is imperative that corrective actions are taken immediately to ensure the safety of our community.”

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The move comes as Ms Metcalfe said North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue was “improving” despite the rising response times.

The Conservative commissioner said the service had been working “at pace to make considerable progress” over the eight recommendations linked to concerns highlighted by government inspectors.

Inspectors rated the fire service as “inadequate” and “requires improvement” last year.

Rural locations

A spokesperson for the commissioner’s office said the increase in response times was a national trend and North Yorkshire’s rural nature “significantly impacts our average response times, due to the travel time required to reach them from their nearest fire station”. They added many station are crewed by on-call firefighters who travel from work or home to attend incidents.

The spokesperson added:

“Last year, due to extremely hot weather, the service attended a large number of fires involving farms and farm vehicles, often located in the more rural areas of the county, meaning longer travel times on slower country roads. These will naturally have impacted on our average response times for last year.”

Ms Metcalfe said the fire service “rigorously analyses and interrogates its response times to all incidents”. She added:

“The service has provided a comprehensive explanation for the change in average response times, and assurances that the increase is not attributable to resource decisions, but to the increase in primary fires taking place in rural locations which require longer travel times.

“The time it takes the service to respond to fires in dwellings is particularly important since these incidents can pose a greater risk to life. The average response time to these types of emergency incidents has continued to be far quicker at 9 minutes 29 seconds, just three seconds slower than other ‘predominantly rural’ services.”

Area manager Damian Henderson, director of service improvement and assurance said:

“I would like to offer reassurance that we always attend incidents as quickly as possible and as part of our response principles we look at primary fires we attend where the average response times are above the average for predominantly rural services.

“This allows us to make proposals for improvement, where we can. We are also increasing our prevention and protection work in our more rural areas. Following the large number of farm related fires we have already undertaken work with the farming community including the production of a farm safety leaflet.”

North Yorkshire fire service ‘improving’ despite rising response times, says commissioner

North Yorkshire’s Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner has said the county’s fire service is improving despite rising response times.

Conservative commissioner Zoe Metcalfe said the service had been working “at pace to make considerable progress” over the eight recommendations linked to concerns highlighted by government inspectors.

Inspectors rated the fire service as “inadequate” and “requires improvement” last year.

Ms Metcalfe told a meeting of North Yorkshire and York’s police, fire and crime panel that following two further inspections to assess progress this year, “initial feedback has been positive” and that the inspectorate was set to publish its findings next week.

She added that areas identified for improvement were on track for completion and the remaining causes of concern were being prioritised.

Ms Metcalfe said following the introduction of a new risk and resource model for the service, “a targeted approach to prevention activities” had been undertaken in the Huntington area, where a controversial move to change the staffing of the station from full-time to on-call is being completed.

However, York councillor Danny Myers told the meeting that according to the latest figures the service had the slowest response time in the country last year.

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In the areas covered by the North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service, people had to wait for an average of 13 minutes and nine seconds for firefighters to respond to incidents.

This includes time spent on the phone reporting the incident, the crew’s preparation and their journey time.

The response time was up on 11 minutes and 37 seconds the year before.

He told the commissioner: 

“It is a serious concern. The direction of travel is not good.”

Cllr Myers said while Huntington was losing its full-time crew and moving to an on-call station it remained unclear what the impact on response times would be.

He added council tax payers in York paid out more than was spent on the fire and rescue service in the city due to the cost of providing the service across the vast rural expanse of North Yorkshire.

Mrs Metcalfe replied that last year she had consulted widely over the risk and resource model and that she had provided information to the panel in “a very full and transparent way”.

Chief fire officer Jonathan Dyson said “it was very easy to get misled by attendance times” as the North Yorkshire was the country’s largest county, spanning some 2,608 square miles.

He said while the service for Devon and Somerset covered a slightly larger area and had 84 fire stations, North Yorkshire had just 38.

Mr Dyson said he agreed that attendance times were important, but they did not take into account fire engines getting stuck behind tractors on rural roads or that on-call firefighters had to travel to the station before travelling to the emergency.

He said the service was working on “prevention protection” for the most vulnerable.

The chief fire officer added if he had millions of pounds extra he would put them into prevention and protection rather than responses, as he would be “faithfully filing every member of the public by not protecting them”.

Firefighters tackle car fire on A1(M)

Firefighters from Ripon, Masham and Knaresborough used breathing apparatus to tackle a major car fire on the A1(M) today.

Fire engines were called to the southbound carriageway at the junction 49 slip road at 7.24am this morning.

North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service‘s incident report said:

“Crews located the Audi that was well alight and extinguished it using one hose reel jet and two breathing apparatus.

“Crews dampened down and made the vehicle safe before leaving the incident in the hands of the highways agency.”

North Yorkshire Police later posted on social media that “the fire is now out and occupants uninjured”.

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North Yorkshire fire service to charge businesses for false alarm calls

North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service will charge businesses so it can “recoup the costs” of sending fire engines out to false alarms.

Between April 2021 and March 2022, the service attended 7,594 incidents across the county but nearly half of those turned out to be false alarms.

The service pledged to tackle the problem in its Risk and Resource Model 2022-2025 as it said the incidents take crews away from potentially life threatening situations.

The Conservative North Yorkshire Police, Fire & Crime Commissioner, Zoe Metcalfe, held an online public meeting around business fire safety and protection when the issue of false alarms came up.

Pete Gregory, head of protection and risk at the service, said the charge might help to stop repeat offenders. He said: 

“If it’s a consistent problem there is an option to charge and recoup costs of going out unnecessarily to some of these sites.

“We are aware of these problematic premises. It’s not necessarily last resort but it’s an option to use when the message is not getting through to individuals.”

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A spokesman for the Police, Fire & Crime Commissioner said the service is “still calculating exactly what the cost will be” but it hopes to publish the figure before the end of this month.

Other fire services that have set a charge include London Fire Brigade which charges £290 after 10 false alarm call-outs.

In North Yorkshire, a charge might be made after a fourth call out within a 12-month period.

The spokesman added:

“A charge will only be considered once engagement from our business fire safety teams with a premises, has not resulted in a reduction of incidents attended. 

“Thankfully, our engagement with premises has been highly successful, so as yet, the option to charge for repeated false alarm attendance has not yet been required.

“We will always undertake proactive work with business owners to help minimise the impact on both the business and ourselves prior to charging, or, taking other measures such as enforcement action, should that be appropriate.”

Firefighters tackle Harrogate hospital fire, A1 crash and barn blaze

A toaster fire at Harrogate District Hospital proved to be just the start of an incident-packed day for local firefighters yesterday.

Crews from Harrogate and Knaresborough were called to the hospital on Lancaster Park Road at 8am.

North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service‘s incident report said:

“The fire originated in an industrial rotating toaster, and caused 25% fire damage to the kitchen, and light smoke logging to a communal area.”

It proved to be the first of several call-outs yesterday.

Teen rescued from car

At 11.07am, firefighters from Boroughbridge and Ripon rushed to a single vehicle car crash at Skelton Road in Boroughbridge where a Peugout 206 had careered off the road.

Crews used an electric saw to get into the vehicle through the windscreen and free a female driver. who was described as “approximately 17” in the incident report. It added:

“The female was uninjured and left in the care of the air ambulance service.”

Two-car crash on A1

A1 at Boroughbridge

The A1 at Boroughbridge

At 12.14pm, crews from Ripon, Boroughbridge and Northallerton responded to reports of a Hyundai and an Audi colliding between junctions 48 and 49 on the northbound A1(M).

The incident report said:

“All occupants of the vehicles were out on arrival. The female driver of the Hyundai, aged approximately 40s, suffered superficial injuries only.

“The male driver, and female passenger of the Audi, both aged approximately 50s, were uninjured. Crews used a turfer winch to remove the vehicles to a safe location.”

Barn fire in Spofforth

At 1.59pm, Harrogate firefighters were back out again. This time they were joined by a crew from Wetherby to a barn fire at Park Lane in Spofforth.

Water bowsers from Tadcaster and Boroughbridge also responded.

The incident report said the barn, which measured about 40 metres by 20 metres, contained straw and the incident was still ongoing by late afternoon.

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Paraplegic Paralympian rescued after bike overturns at Lofthouse

Firefighters helped a paraplegic Paralympic athlete whose bike overturned on a notorious steep hill near Lofthouse today.

On call firefighters from Lofthouse, near Pateley Bridge, were called to Trapping Hill at 11.56am.

North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service‘s incident report said the unnamed athlete’s adapted recumbent bicycle “overturned while descending a steep hill after the tyre popped off the rim”.

The report added:

“Crew transferred male to a local farmer’s vehicle who then returned him to his adapted van.

“Male then returned to the scene where crew were able to secure his bike in his vehicle.”

With its stunning scenery and steep gradient, Trapping Hill is a popular but highly challenging route for cyclists.

A family needed rescuing from Trapping Hill in December last year when their car got stuck on black ice.

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Hazardous response team rescue person from Ripon Canal

Specialist paramedics and other emergency workers came to the rescue of a person on a boat on Ripon Canal last night.

Firefighters from Ripon were summoned to Boroughbridge Road, which runs alongside the canal basin, at 12.23am.

They were responding to a request from paramedics to help move a patient from a boat, according to North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service.

Its incident report said:

“Crews assisted to move the casualty into a seated position to allow paramedics to carry out an assessment.”

The report added firefighters then liaised with paramedics and staff from Yorkshire Ambulance Service’s hazardous area response team, which provides emergency treatment in precarious rescue operations.

The report said:

“Crews then assisted the casualty from the boat to the pontoon and left them in the care of ambulance crews.”

No further details have been released.

The canal held an open day yesterday to celebrate its 250th anniversary.

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Firefighters rescue baby locked in car in Ripon

Firefighters from Ripon rescued a baby that was locked inside a car in the city yesterday.

North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service’s incident report for last night said firefighters were called to Rotary Way at 6pm.

Rotary Way is a short distance from Ripon Fire Station’s site on Stonebridgegate and is the location of St Michael’s Retail Park, which includes M&S Simply Food.

The circumstances surrounding the incident are not revealed in detail.

The incident log added:

“Crews used small tools also with the assistance of a civilian mechanic at the scene.

“The baby was left in the hands of parents, advice given.”

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Firefighters rescue 16-year-old dog in Harrogate

Harrogate firefighters rescued a 16-year-old dog that had got stuck on a path yesterday.

A crew from Skipton Road were summoned to nearby Dene Park in Bilton at 9.43pm last night.

According to North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service’s incident report, the dog was too frail to stand.

It said:

“Fire control received a call from a resident who was concerned for the safety of a 16-year-old dog who was unable to get up and was laid in the middle of the path.

“The caller stated the dog was very old and his owner was also an elderly gent.

“Other residents were unable to lift the dog and take him back home. A fire crew from Harrogate attended whilst still maintaining their availability and assisted by lifting and carrying the dog back home to his owner.”

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Fire station open day set to draw crowds in Harrogate

Harrogate Fire Station will welcome members of the public to its popular annual open day next weekend.

The Skipton Road site will open its doors on Sunday, September 3 from 10am until 3pm.

Visitors will be able to see a variety of fire engines, including some demonstrations and interaction, and speak to members of North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service.

Children will have the chance to pretend to be a firefighter, as well as learning basic first aid from St John Ambulance.

North Yorkshire Police, Upper Wharfedale Fell Rescue and the Red Cross will also be represented, along with some police vehicles on site too.

The open day is free, though there is a charge for some of the activities.

A bouncy castle, refreshments and a raffle will all be held, and donations can also be made to the Fire Fighters Charity.

 

 

Visitors get to know the emergency services at last year’s open day

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