Tuesday, May 21, 2013

Arson About !!!!

Oh dear, I  have been accused of slacking - by probably the one person who is allowed to tell me off without getting his head ripped off shortly after. So  grovelling apology to Dave from the FBU - i shall get back to my keyboard at once.



I do have a very good excuse though, i have moved house (from very high risk to low risk  area) and now live less than 200 yds from a fire station in West Yorkshire; so if there is to be afirefighters  strike at some point soon at least one FBU picket line will be getting regular deliveries of hot drinks and food. On the understanding i expect the best response times EVER if the house has a fire!!! Well till it's closed, sniff !


Anyway  - way back in March we talked about MORLEY , well that post lead to us doing some more research and we have discovered that Morley like many stations is not having incidents that they attend reported in the WYFRS public incident logs.

Lets demonstrate this with three recent incidents....all house fires 
(house fires =  those things that management would have you believe are going down )

20th April 2013  there were two house fires. .......both arson.

One at Askey Avenue LS27 0EG which is a HIGH RISK area  . This incident was a reported arson attack, fire fighters in breathing apparatus attended the fire in the kitchen and although the fire was contained the house was badly smoked damaged.



The same day in Wide Lane, Morley LS27 8BU yet again a HIGH RISK area an outhouse was ignited and the fire spread to the dwelling . This was definitely an arson attack as it was confirmed by the householder it was their  estranged spouse that was involved (the house has already been subject to arson intervention by WYFRS) and we suspect the spouse is even more estranged now!

9th April 2013,  there was yet another house fire  in Springbank Crescent,LS27 7DN which is deemed to be LOW RISK . It was a household appliance that ignited. (we have discussed these too recently , please click here to read the article )  It was a family with young children and potentially was a disaster in the making.

 .
                                                                          

So three house  fires.................. two arson and one in a low risk area !


We can't help wondering why WYFRS are keeping Morley Fire Stations incidents under wraps .............could it be because in January 2014 WYFRS intend to turn Morley to DAY CREWING!!!!


FCCL are not advocates of day  crewing - for many reasons. The main two being 

1. we can add up 
2.  we can also interpret data  from oracle correctly.

we could add a third  

TO ENABLE DAY CREWING TO WORK 
YOU NEED YOUR CREWS TO LIVE WITHIN A 
5 MINUTE RESPONSE RADIUS TO THE STATION.

SO ........ how many firefighters currently at Morley fulfill the criteria above  (we will give you a bit of help,
 there are currently 27 staff at Morley) 

Can WYFRS even start to contemplate shifting staff around to enable them to have a full compliment of staff living within 5 mins by 2014. Surely they will have done their home work,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, 




NOPE it seems not. Mind you neither have the labour councillors who sit on the LABOUR CONTROLLED Fire Authority. 
Ed Balls MP

A few weeks ago Ed Balls visited Morley Fire Station along with several of the local labour councillors.  CFO Pilling sent a couple of his senior staff along to ensure that the  CREWS DID NOT TALK ABOUT THE PROPOSED CHANGES IN STAFFING. Simons henchmen failed miserably as Ed kicked off the conversation by talking about the IRMP and proposed changes at Morley. Apparently CFO Pillings henchmen got rather uncomfortable as when it was said that the fire authority had approved  the proposed system of day  crewing one of the councillors said "Oh No it wasnt !"  Apparently what had been discussed was  closing Morley and Hunslet and the construction of a two pump"superstation" at a site indentified near the White Rose Centre OR removing a pump at Hunslet and having  two one pump stations. Day crewing was NOT DISCUSSED. 

Sadly we also hear that intimidation  and  a culture of top down bullying is rife at WYFRS, something we have heard time and time again but we sincerely hope that  crews and members of the Fire Brigades Union have the courage of their (correct) convictions and continue to fight these ridiculous proposals of day crewing. 

Is Simon Pilling  seriously so blind and arrogant to think he can pull the wool over the eyes of the community of Morley?  

As we said way back in December, the FBU, FCCL and the local community of West Yorkshire have driven a wedge of transparency   into the strangle hold  he seemed to have over the fire authority in previous years. We commend the crews and community at Morley and will do anything we can to assist them in their fight to keep Morley fully staffed and  24 hour operational. 

Who in their right mind would want to add FIVE MINUTES TO RESPONSE  TIMES  ?   It's time to remind a certain CFO that he is the monkey NOT the organ grinder at WYFRS - he serves the community NOT the other way round. 





We are sure the campaign to keep Morley  24 hour crewed will be featuring again in this blog ................... watch this space. 

And finally, tomorrows post will be  around the subject of  a tape measure, 4 inches and a shiny new fire engine !  ( we swear you couldn't make it up ) 

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Typical, I look forward to tomorrows blog, I'm sure it will be an "up lifting " experience!