Memorandum by Paul Holmes MP (FRS 14)
The FiReControl Project proposes to close the
East Midlands" five emergency fire control rooms (presently
in Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire, Lincolnshire and
Northamptonshire) and replace them with one control room in Castle
Donnington, Leicestershire that will serve the entire region.
As the Liberal Democrat Shadow Secretary of
State for Local Government and Communities, Sarah Teather MP has
argued, the impetus for fire service reform came from the Bain
review but focussed on the need for more fire prevention rather
than just fire-fighting. Effective fire prevention can be achieved
only by a community-based force. Bain advised specifically against
regional reorganisation and instead proposed regional co-operation,
which he argued would achieve all the benefits of without major
structural change. Compulsory regional fire control rules out
the possibility of co-operation between emergency services. The
successful tri-service control centre in Gloucestershire would
have to be broken up under the current proposals for regional
fire control rooms.
The Government claims that these new regional
control rooms will be more "resilient" and "secure"
than the existing network of local control rooms. Yet the East
Midlands Fire Brigades Union (FBU) is gravely concerned that the
location of the new East Midlands control room in a business park
on a flood plain and within two miles of an airport will be neither
resilient nor secure.
The cost of this restructure is escalating.
As the East Midlands FBU notes, in August 2005 Jim Fitzpatrick
confirmed that regional control rooms will cost as much as £2
billion—more than the £1.7 billion annual fire service
budget. In just two months the projected costs had doubled, from
£988 million in June. Information obtained under the Freedom
of Information Act shows that consultancy fees alone are projected
to be £44 million.
The East Midlands FBU has drawn to my attention
the ODPM's Outline Business Case. This states that there is a
"high risk" that spiralling costs will lead to pressure
to cut frontline services and could push up council tax. It also
states that the risk of "delay or even total project failure"
is "high" with a "very high" impact if it
does fail.[1]
The risk is so high because of "the recent history of delivering
IT/change projects in the public sector has demonstrated a less
than 50% success rate".[2]
There is a high risk that "the current provisional timescales
may not be achieved" which would "increase project cost"
at an estimated £11.4 million per six month delay per region.
1 Outline Business Case, p 42, Resilience Risk Profile
table, para 141. Back
2
Ibid. Back
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