Fire response times under fresh focus in Shropshire

On-call firefighters could be allowed to live further away from their stations in a bid to attract recruits.

Shropshire Fire and Rescue Service requires firefighters to be able to reach a base within five minutes, but this may soon increase to six or seven minutes in some areas.

The recommendation follows a review carried out amid concerns over dwindling personnel availability.

The service said it was performing well in terms of emergency response times.

At any time there are about 310 firefighters on call across the county.

Chief fire officer Simon Hardiman said: "We are really proud of the availability we have got, but we are aware it is starting to decline slowly.

"I would rather have a fire engine available in six minutes than not at all."

The five-minute turn-in time should be assessed at a station-by-station level, a report said.

The review - research by on-call firefighter Steven Sadler - made 12 recommendations on which the service said it was taking action.

On-call firefighters sign up to an 80-hour or 120-hour-a-week contract, but often go beyond that.

The review's recommendations include re-visiting contracts and implementing a new rota system.

Mr Hardiman said the service aimed to have a fully-equipped crew at an incident in an urban area within 10 minutes, "town and fringe 15 minutes and rural areas 20 minutes, and we look to achieve that in 85 per cent of incidents".

He added its response standard was at about 94%.

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