Firefighters will go ahead with a national strike on Wednesday after their union rejected the 11% pay offer recommended by an independent review.

Firefighters' leader Andy Gilchrist angrily rejected both the pay offer and the review, saying government interventions in the pay dispute had been "despicable".

Strike dates

13-15 November Starts and ends at 1800 GMT 22-30 November Starts/ ends 0900 4-12 December Starts/ ends 0900 16-24 December Starts/ ends 0900

The 48-hour national strike will start on Wednesday evening.

Three other eight-day strikes are planned for before Christmas - the first national walkouts for 25 years.

Tony Blair said the strike was "wrong, unjustified, unnecessary".

His official spokesman said the prime minister did not think the public would think it was the "right way to carry on".

Firefighter employers said they would not give in to "bully boy tactics".

John Rainsford, of the Local Government Association, said there was a need for a more "streamlined, focused and flexible" fire service and an end to "restrictive union practices".

He said: "We will not yield to unrealistic union wage demands nor capitulate to bully boy tactics designed to hold this country to ransom and put lives at risk."

Emergency cover

Downing Street said the civil contingencies committee would meet on Wednesday to consider how to respond to the firefighters' strike.

Emergency cover during the strikes will be provided by the military, equipped with Green Goddess fire tenders.

Oxfordshire chief fire officer John Parry warned that lives could be lost and urged residents to protect themselves as far as possible by fitting smoke alarms and driving more carefully.

"The public is going to be at risk and potentially lives are going to be lost," he said.

The independent review had recommended the 11% pay rise over two years, linked to changes in working practices. The union is demanding 40%.

Bob Miller died in action

Mr Gilchrist said the union had spent six months trying to negotiate a way through the dispute.

But he said there had been two "despicable interruptions" by the government who, he said, seemed intent on provoking a national strike action in the fire service.

He said: "We have had no alternative (but) to reject a derisory and insulting offer to some of the finest public servants in the world."

Mr Gilchrist announced with "incredible regret" that the strike would go ahead and blamed the intervention of the Bain report which, he said, had scuppered the talks.

Mr Gilchrist, who was cheered by firefighters demonstrating outside the talks, said he was not worried that public opinion would desert the firefighters.

Firefighters and emergency fire control staff have been "modernising" for years without a pay rise. Why should they back down? J Drake, Gloucs

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He also rejected government claims that it was irresponsible, at a time of heightened security tension, to go on strike.

The collapse of the pay talks came as hundreds of firefighters attended a funeral in Leicester for firefighter Bob Miller, who was killed on duty last month in a factory fire.

A 45-minute service at the city's cathedral was broadcast to crowds outside.

Sir George Bain, who headed the independent review of the fire service, said: "I don't believe the inquiry has scuppered the chances of a resolution.

"In the longer term it provides the only basis on which any kind of rational and equitable deal can be done."

He said both sides would have to return to the negotiating table, whether or not there was a strike, and he said his proposals would be there for them to work on.

Fire dispute at a glance
	Pay	Bain Review	Working Practices
Fire Brigades Union	Firefighters are calling for a 40% rise	FBU leader: "He has effectively wrecked the pay talks."	FBU leader: "Modernising the service should not be an excuse to undermine the union."
Employers	The employers have offered them an interim 4% rise	They have warmly welcomed the Bain report endorsing its "vision" of the future	"Any increase above 4% would have to be linked to modernisation and supported financially by the government."
Bain Review	Recommends a 4% rise in 2002 followed by 7% in 2003	"I think in the longer term it provides the only basis on which any kind of rational and equitable deal can be done."	Calls for reform and end to overtime ban and for more flexible working practices in return for a raise
Fire Service Minister	"We made it clear that if they [the employers] went beyond 4% they would have to fund that."	"I believe most fair-minded people would regard it as a good basis for the future terms of the fire service."	"Investment in public services must go hand in hand with improvement and modernisation."