North councillors express concern about fire cover in the area
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Councillors in Caithness and Sutherland have claimed their area is regularly left with no cover in the event of a fire.
Thurso councillors Matthew Reiss and Ron Gunn highlighted that Thurso station is only available for emergency calls half of the time while Sutherland member Richard Gale said he is concerned about the safety of his communities.
The Scottish Fire and Rescue Service (SFRS) report to Highland Council accepted there are long-standing challenges with recruitment.
In the six months from 1 April to 30 September 2022, station availability was patchy at best.
Caithness and Lochaber stations were available just 56 per cent of the time, with Skye and Lochalsh averaging 59 per cent.
Michael Humphreys, SFRS senior officer for Highland, offered reassurance that the service is taking steps to improve. He said that recruitment is an ongoing challenge UK-wide.
Mr Humphreys pointed to two trials. The first, allowing bank staff from fully-crewed stations to take up shifts in areas that are short-staffed.
The second, a joint mobilisation effort. This started in Tongue and Bettyhill and saw crews at the two stations join forces at an agreed rendezvous point to give them enough manpower to respond to emergencies. The fire service hopes to extend this trial to other areas.
Currently there needs to be four firefighters to attend call-outs, and this means many rural forces can’t respond.
In 2018, the fire service demonstrated new rapid response units outside the council chamber. Members were told the smaller rigs could run with a crew of three instead of four, vastly improving availability in rural Highland.
However, Mr Reiss said these rigs were never put into operation.
Speaking after the debate, Mr Humphreys commented: "We operate Rapid Response Units (RRUs) in certain areas with a minimum of four personnel.
"The safety of our staff is a priority. There must be a minimum of four crew members, including an officer in charge with a valid incident command certificate, a driver with a valid emergency response certificate and two qualified breathing apparatus wearers."
Mr Reiss called for a rethink on how fire services operate in Highland – and an end to centralisation.
"For about the last six or seven years, this council has been aware of worries about the level of fire cover in different parts of Highland,” he said.
"We need to decentralise, and rural areas – what used to be the Highlands and Islands fire and rescue service – need to be entrusted to be more flexible in how they deal with these challenges."
He added: "This used to be an outstanding service."
Mr Reiss quoted figures he had received through a freedom of information request. He provided several dates this summer where he claimed there was no cover whatsoever in Caithness, Sutherland, Western Isles, Skye and Lochaber.
He said on 6 June 2022 there was no cover from Gairloch to Durness, across to Caithness and down to Golspie.
Referring to his own ward of Thurso and northwest Caithness, Mr Reiss said it had less than 50 per cent cover for the past three months. His ward colleague Ron Gunn also highlighted that availability for the second appliance in Thurso was just 21 per cent.
Mr Humphreys said Thurso had a number of crew on leave, and new recruits joining, affecting availability. He also said factors like sick leave and engine maintenance had an impact.
"It is recognised that our on-call availability is transient," he added.
Mr Humphreys disputed claims of no cover across much of Highland and provided his own data setting out high availability levels on the specific dates in question.
Mr Reiss told councillors he had resorted to an FOI because “That’s the level of desperation I am at.”
The SFRS said that between April and September 2022, Wick and Thurso’s first appliances had 98 per cent and 92 per cent availability respectively. Dornoch and Lairg had 97 per cent and 93 per cent respectively.
However, because the second appliance isn’t always available, this drags the overall average down to around 50 per cent.
Mr Humphreys added: "There is no doubt that we experience challenges in recruiting firefighters right across Scotland and it is no different here in Highland.
"We continue to work to boost recruitment of on call firefighters and we have 78 personnel across the Highland area going through that process at the moment.
"The service will always maintain fire cover and ensure we continue to attend at every emergency. This can involve the strategic movement of appliances and individual personnel from other stations within the area if required."
