Emergency services should not share vehicles, says chairman

THE idea of police officers, firefighters and paramedics sharing the same vehicle to attend an incident has been rubbished by Essex Police Federation.

Mark Smith, Chairman of Essex Police Federation, said: “Let’s remember who we are… we’re police officers and we have different types of jobs to deal with to ambulance and fire.”

The idea comes from the outgoing Police and Crime Commissioner Nick Alston.

He told the Essex Fire Authority: “Road traffic collisions highlight the curious situation that we may currently send three different emergency services to a collision when a small mixed team in one vehicle might well be able to deal with most situations.”

However Mr Smith hit back. “Just because police attend, just because we attend originally, it may not be a job for us and once the fire brigade or ambulance are there, who should be there, then we can go away and do our other duties. If we haven’t got a car that resource is then tied up there, isn’t it?

“That’s not a good use of resources. You’re sending everybody to everything. I’m not really sure how that works and am totally against full mergers. I think there are jobs that we have in the past attended which the other emergency services could take off us and should be doing.

“But I think let’s remember who we are, we’re police officers and we have different types of jobs to deal with to ambulance and fire. Ambulance and fire, I think, would work fairly well together, I don’t think police fits into that.”

The Government is calling for greater “blue light collaboration” between police, fire and ambulance services and is legislating that in some areas, Police and Crime Commissioners could run their local fire and rescue services.

Mr Alston said it is “important that the infrastructure of the emergency services – the buildings, the support staff, the transport, the information technology and the communications – help deliver the best possible response to people in danger in the most effective and efficient fashion”.