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Raising the alarm




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A campaign has been launched to ensure the future of Southwell Fire Station.

Concerns have been raised that the station might be at risk of closure by Nottinghamshire Fire and Rescue Service.

The service said it had no plans to close the station.

Despite this, a petition has been sent to homes by Southwell Town Council.

The council leader and chairman of the town’s safer neighbourhood group, Mr Peter Harris, said he was not convinced that the fire station was safe.

He believed it had been on a shortlist for closure.

“We have already had more than 150 responses to our petition to keep the fire station open,” Mr Harris said.

“The response time is meant to be eight minutes and they are very good at doing that. When fighting fire, minutes matter and, if the fire station closed, crews would be coming from Newark or Mansfield.”

Mr Harris said that even if the station — manned by a retained crew — was not closed immediately, it might still be at risk.

He said: “There has been a recommendation not to recruit further retained staff and to go for full-time staff.

“Southwell may be safe but if they are not going to put more retained staff in then Southwell will close by default.

“We need more retained staff because they are obviously very effective and cheaper for the town and for the fire authority.”

Retained stations are staffed by volunteers who live or work in the communities they serve and respond to pagers in times of emergency.

Mr Harris urged residents to sign the petition.

Southwell’s watch manager Mr Fraser McNish said: “Southwell at the moment is safe. Whether that means it will be safe for the future I don’t know, but there is no intention that it will close at the moment.

“Obviously we are concerned for our colleagues because a lot of stations around Southwell will be affected and there are people we have worked with for years whose jobs are at risk.”

Mr McNish said firefighters in Southwell attended 200 incidents each year and were likely to become busier as other stations closed.

The concerns were raised as Nottinghamshire Fire and Rescue Service tries to make budget reductions of £4.9m over the next two years.

A spokesman said the retained recruitment needs of each station would be considered on its merits.

A two-year recruitment freeze on full-time firefighters is expected.



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