Fire services - Sloppiness that could cost lives

IF the one million plus people who rely on Dublin Fire Brigade to come to their help in their moment of crisis have their confidence in the service undermined by a report that has uncovered poor management and training, then we would be foolish not to wonder if similar problems exist in the country’s 36 other fire services.

Ken Knight, one of Britain’s chief fire rescue advisers, has found that the structures and procedures in the capital’s fire service represented a threat to not only the public but the service’s staff as well. It goes without saying that this is unacceptable in a service that responds to 145,000 calls a year and costs nearly €120 million.

Avoiding the guarded language beloved of consultants and politicians, he put it bluntly: everyone involved, firefighters and the public, “could be vulnerable to a significant safety event in the future”. He warned that Dublin Fire Brigade’s training is ineffective. He also warned that because the service does not properly correlate data, it does not know how well it performs.