Tyne and Wear’s fire service has warned it could be forced to make “difficult” cuts next year unless the government covers the cost of pay rises.
Finance bosses have issued a gloomy prediction that the organisation could soon be facing a shortfall of more than £1m and have to slash frontline services to make up the gap. While backing calls for a substantial pay rise for firefighters, the area’s chief fire officer, councillors, and the Northumbria Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) pleaded with the government this week to protect fire and rescue services amid warnings of a “tsunami” of money struggles – as the cost of living crisis bites local authorities as well as households.
Members of the Tyne and Wear Fire and Rescue Authority were told on Wednesday that the service could be left with a £1.3m burden if national pay agreements result in higher than expected rises for staff. Finance director Dennis Napier said that officials had “underestimated” the scale of the cost of living crisis, with inflation having now rocketed to more than 9.4%, when budgeting for 3% staff pay rises this year and now faced “quite a significant shock” to the balance sheet.
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Fire service support staff are being offered a £1,925 pay rise, averaging out to a 7.32% increase in the Tyne and Wear service (TWFRS) and putting a £341,000 unfunded cost on the organisation’s budget for this year. Mr Napier hypothesised that a similar agreement for firefighters would bring the total overspend to £1.3m, though no such offer has been made yet.
The Fire Brigades Union has already rejected a proposed 2% pay rise and warned that its members “have never taken industrial action lightly but nor can we allow this pay insult to pass without challenge”.
Tyne and Wear’s chief fire officer, Chris Lowther, said on Wednesday that all fire service staff should get a real terms pay rise this year – but that the money must come from central government and not local budgets. Mr Lowther said that TWFRS had become an “an extremely lean organisation” and, while the cost of pay rises above 3% could be covered by its cash reserves, bosses would face “difficult decisions” about cutbacks next year.
PCC Kim McGuinnes added that she was “deeply frustrated” by the government’s refusal to help, saying: “They give with one hand to our hard-working staff, but will take with the other in terms of making it more difficult for them to do their jobs because of what has to go. That is not a choice we should have to make locally.”
On top of escalating fuel and energy bills, there are also concerns that the rising price of steel could push up the cost of a new £8m ‘tri station’ due to be built in Hebburn. Newcastle Lib Dem councillor Tom Woodwark accused the government of enforcing a “new austerity”, adding: “This is a new tsunami coming towards every authority in the country and to this one in particular.
“Fuel prices are going up, energy prices continue to go up. We have a government which clearly wants to have industrial action for its own political ends, it is absolutely clear that is what’s happening. The outcomes are pretty stark for this authority and pretty worrying.”
Sunderland councillor Phil Tye, chair of the fire authority, also backed a significant pay rise for firefighters and vowed to lobby the government alongside MPs to secure the funding needed.
He said: “Why should the residents of Tyne and Wear suffer more [due to budget cuts] when they are already in a difficult position? It will be very difficult but we are not going to rest on our laurels, we are not going to just accept it.”
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