A TAYSIDE Fire Board member said the survival of full-time night cover at Balmossie fire station looked difficult to defend in the wake of new statistics showing that it dealt with only five overnight primary outbreaks in the last nine months.
Angus councillor Bob Myles believed the new single Scottish fire service would have to make an early decision on the future of the facility that serves Broughty Ferry and Monifieth and is one of the quietest permanently-staffed stations in the country.
“I think it is indefensible that Balmossie should continue to have a full-time crew overnight when the statistics show it is so quiet,” he said.
“There are part-time stations served by retained crews that are busier than Balmossie.
“Officers of Tayside Fire and Rescue tried to do something about this before by reducing Balmossie to retained cover overnight to allow a full-time crew to be based at Forfar, but the issue became political and councillors voted this down.
“I know the figures don’t show all the home safety visits that Balmossie carries out but, if you look at it in the round it is ludicrous to keep it as a full-time station round the clock. I think it will be one of the early decisions the new all-Scotland fire service will have to make if they are looking at how to organise viable resources across the whole of the country.
“I cannot see how there can continue to be a full-time service round the clock at Balmossie, unless it is for political reasons again, but I think that would be crazy.”
Balmossie dealt with only one outbreak in a house, other building or car between 6pm and 8am in December, two in November, one in August and one in June. It didn’t deal with any overnight primary fires in its area in October, September, July, May or April.
Kingsway and Perth stations each dealt with 54 primary fires overnight between April and December 2012, Macalpine with 53, Blackness 41 and Arbroath 12.
Balmossie dealt with only another five fires during daytime during the last nine months and had the lowest figures for all other categories of incident, including road accidents and false alarms during daytime.
In the whole of the previous year, Balmossie dealt with 22 night-time primary fires, and another 16 during daytime hours.
The Fire Brigades Union has consistently said the figures do not show the workload carried out by Balmossie, where the annual number of home safety visits runs to more than a thousand, and many of them are done at night.
Jim Malone, Tayside official of the FBU, said there was agreement that there should be no change in the number of stations and appliances when the new national service takes over, so the immediate future of Balmossie is guaranteed.
The further structure and delivery of the new Scotland fire service will be discussed in the context of a new integrated risk management plan, and the FBU in Tayside would be pressing for the continuation of the gold star service which the area presently enjoys.
The Scottish Fire and Rescue Service said its clear focus will be to ensure community safety, while delivering best value to the public though protecting the frontline and living within agreed budgets.
“As part of that, we will be examining the current design of the service by carrying out a detailed strategic assessment across Scotland,” said a spokeswoman.
“That will allow us to identify how resources are currently used and establish the best use of services going forward.”
aargo@thecourier.co.uk