Mr.
Dhanda: As someone whose mother worked in a hospital, I
think that that is a good thing. It is good to see people from BME
backgrounds contributing to public services, which I think they do
disproportionately. They can also contribute to the fire and rescue
service, which should change its methods so that it looks outwards and
recruits more of those people to it. Across the board in the service,
everybody—fire and rescue authorities, the unions and so
on—has agreed to those demanding targets. The unions pushed me
even further, and I am grateful for that. We have set up an additional
fund of £2 million for those fire and rescue authorities that
choose to recruit 18 per cent. or more women into operational ranks,
and 2 to 5 per cent. more people from BME background above the local
BME proportion in the locality. It is their choice to do so, but,
disproportionately, fire and rescue authorities and chief fire officers
tell me that it is a great idea.
Mr.
Peter Kilfoyle (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab): The Minister has
referred three times to the unions in a rather different context to Her
Majesty’s Opposition, who seem to have found a new amity with
the FBU. Given the amount that they refer to the FBU, does he agree
that the time might be right for the Opposition to start consulting
with the National Union of Mineworkers on energy
policy?
Mr.
Dhanda: I concur with my hon. Friend, who makes a good
point. However, I do not want to go too far down that path as I might
incur your wrath, Mr. Benton.
The last key
point relates to the area of difference around fire control. Opposition
Members obviously have an interesting alliance with the FBU on this
matter, but it is important to clarify that there are a range of views
in the FBU. Its members often tell me that on saving the lives of the
general public and improving the service for firefighters, so that they
can have the experience to allow them to get to the scene of an
incident more quickly, the big difference will be made by fire control.
We should not listen to the vocal voices who are lobbying shadow
spokespersons very hard—
Mr.
Jackson: Will the Minister give
way?
Mr.
Dhanda: I will give way in a few moments, but it is
important that I make some key points about fire control. If hon.
Members oppose the order, they will be voting not only against the
stakeholder coalition and the greater degree of localism that I have
highlighted, but against the diversity strategy that we have brought in
and some of the new things that fire control will provide in the
constituencies of all hon.
Members. I
will describe a few of those things. First, there will be mobile data
terminals—MDTs—and software provision for those in
appliance cabs. Hardware will be provided through the complementary
Firelink project. MDTs allow electronic safety information to be
provided in the cab of a fire appliance to assist crews during
operational incidents. That will include details of known risks and
hazards in the building or locality. Hon. Members might have been out
with fire crews, as I have, and have had to work in a dark,
smoke-filled room without knowing the shape and structure of that room.
If they oppose the measure, they will be voting against technology that
would give our firefighters in the cab knowledge of
buildings’ floor plans. In some hon. Members’
constituencies, firefighters might already have that, as is the case in
the constituency of the hon. Member for North-West Norfolk, where real
advances have been made with Firelink. However, the shadow spokesman on
fire and rescue, the hon. Member for Peterborough, does not have that
in his patch, but he would be voting against it. The hon. Member for
North Cornwall does not have that in his patch—does he think
that the firefighters there deserve it, or is he going to vote against
it? Mr.
Jackson: Will the hon. Gentleman give
way?
Mr.
Dhanda: I shall, but I want to finish my point before I
give way to the hon.
Gentleman. There
will also be automatic vehicle location systems. This is about MDTs
containing global positioning systems, with transmitters showing the
exact location of the appliance—both standard appliances and
specialist new dimension resources. It is incredibly important for us
to know where our appliances are, if we are to locate the nearest
appliance to the scene. Hon. Members might think that such technology
already exists in their fire and rescue services, but it does not. It
does not exist in mine. I shall circulate a table to all Members of
Parliament showing just how many areas it does not exist in, which is
extraordinary. It does not exist in the constituency of the hon. Member
for Peterborough. It does not exist in the constituency of the hon.
Member for North Cornwall either. Does he think that his constituents
deserve that? I do. I am willing to put up £360 million to make
sure that they have
it. Furthermore,
there is satellite navigation. Many hon. Members might already have
that in their vehicles. Do they think that we should have it in our
fire appliances? Personally, I think that we should. If we are going to
have that, Opposition Members will have to swallow their pride, forget
about some of the briefings that they are getting from the FBU, and
listen to other members of the FBU and to other unions, including, as
the hon. Member for North Cornwall mentioned, the Retained Firefighters
Union, which has been supportive on such issues. If that union believes
that we should be able to have satellite navigation, he should
certainly believe in it for his fire appliances as
well. The
enhanced information service for emergency calls is important. It
allows the billing address of the phone from which an emergency call is
being made to be displayed to the control room operator, thereby
speeding up the task of confirming the caller’s location. That
is true local knowledge of where that person is when their house is
burning down or their loved ones are in peril. The technology can also
be used to locate the whereabouts of a mobile phone caller by
identifying the network cell from which they are calling. That is
particularly useful for when callers are reporting incidents on the
road network and are unaware of their exact location. We also have huge
problems in this country due to hoax
callers. Here is an opportunity to diminish—perhaps even to help
eradicate—that, through fire control and being able to trace
people’s
calls. Mr.
Jackson: Will the hon. Gentleman give
way?
Mr.
Dhanda: I shall give way to the hon. Gentleman in a
moment, but I must say that his constituents and fire and rescue
service do not have that technology. The constituents of the hon.
Member for North Cornwall happen to have that particular element, but
there are many others that do not, and do not have the possibility of
using in-cab technology to tell firefighters, when they arrive on the
scene of a car accident, where to cut into a vehicle to avoid the air
bags. I think that all of these matters are
important.
Mr.
Jackson: This is an example of blinding with
science. The Minister might be surprised by the fraternal solidarity
that I have with my hon. comrade, the hon. Member for Liverpool,
Walton, but this is about taking cognisance of the intelligent views of
the Fire Brigades Union. Frankly, it has responded with independent
advice and data on the outline business cases that have been published
by the Department for the past four or five years. It is not a
knee-jerk reaction from the Fire Brigades Union. I do not resile from
Her Majesty’s Opposition being in a position to take advice from
key stakeholders, be they the Local Government Association or the Fire
Brigades Union, but we would be failing in our duty as an Opposition if
we did not draw the facts to the attention of the House. The regional
control centre programme is hugely behind schedule. It is massively
over budget, and a huge amount of taxpayers’ money has been
wasted through the purchase and lease of buildings throughout the
country. This is opposition, whether the Minister likes it or
not.
Mr.
Dhanda: I have no problem with opposition, but I disagree
with opposition for opposition’s sake. I disagree with
opposition that puts the lives of our constituents in danger, and I
disagree with opposition that will result in the fire and rescue
service having a poorer technological solution to their day-to-day
problems. The hon. Gentleman says that this it is delayed and way over
budget, but this £360 million project will be delivered and
completed well in advance of the Olympics. Every single constituent in
the land will benefit from a single networked solution, rather than 46
independent
ones. The
hon. Gentleman does not seem to believe me when I tell him that there
are examples, not least in my constituency when there was severe
flooding, of existing technological solutions not being able to cope.
That is a fact; the local fire and rescue service gave us that
information. We have seen that happen not just in my area, but in
Buckinghamshire. We have had chief fire officers telling us about it.
It is a real and current problem. If we are going to do something about
the resilience problems that we are likely to face in our nation, we
will have to be brave, and sometimes say to the FBU that it should come
and talk to us. I want to engage with it on this. Unfortunately, it has
not wanted to engage at a local level. I have tried to talk to it on a
national level, but that has been very difficult, to say the least. It
is sometimes the role of politicians to say that this is the right
thing to do, and that is why I am going
to disagree with the hon. Gentleman, however difficult it might be for
him to sell the message to his own Members. Graham
Stringer (Manchester, Blackley) (Lab): I have been
listening carefully to my hon. Friend’s arguments, and it might
well be that I have missed something. I would be grateful if he could
help me or correct me. I would imagine that every member of this
Committee would be in favour of the new technology, whether it is GPS,
satellite navigation or better software, to enable firefighters to know
where they are. However, is he trying to link the introduction of that
new technology to regional control centres? If he is, can he please
explain why, in Greater Manchester for instance, we could not have all
that technology based at the Greater Manchester level? I have missed
that
logic.
Mr.
Dhanda: I am grateful to my hon. Friend. I suppose that we
could create 46 different control rooms, all having that technology,
but we have to learn from best examples from abroad. Frankly, not only
do we want to increase resilience, but there is a business case here
for savings. We do not need the 46 different systems, and if there is
any hon. Member in the room who says that they want Firelink, new
dimensions and fire control, and that they can deliver it to all 46
control rooms, at
the cost of well over £2 billion, that person should intervene
right now and say that they are prepared to do so. If they are not,
they should be frank and honest about the matter and see how this,
allied with other things in the national framework, which has been
agreed with our stakeholders, around diversity, working with our local
communities, and resilience, will make a huge difference to our local
communities. That is why I hope that all members of the Committee will
support the
order. 11.4
am
Mr.
Bellingham: I listened very carefully to what the Minister
said. He made several very good points. We are still not convinced
about what he said about regional control centres, but he has explained
to us that the business case is to be published in the near future.
There will obviously be other opportunities for the Opposition to hold
the Government to account on this and to challenge the Government. On
that basis, albeit somewhat reluctantly, we will not be voting against
the Government today. I am grateful to the Minister for what he said in
his closing
speech. Question
put and agreed
to. Resolved, That
the Committee has considered the Fire and Rescue Services (National
Framework) (England) Order 2008 (S.I. 2008, No.
1370) Committee
rose at five minutes past Eleven
o’clock.
|
