Letter To Fire Authority Councillors

Councillors of the West Yorkshire Fire Authority 
cc - to Inner East Leeds Councillors & MPs 

We wish to inform you that we have applied to English Heritage for Gipton Fire  Station to be listed as an historic asset.The community have applied for her to be grade 2 listed. 

As members of  WYFRA  we believe that your decision in December 2011 to close  and sell Gipton  which is by National Audit Office  standards a LOW COST station was wrong, moving the fire and rescue service further away from areas of very high risk in inner east Leeds  As you are no doubt aware this decision has opened the flood gates and now you are being asked to vote in December  2012 to axe even more stations. 

However,  this email is to ask for support to review the decision you made in Dec 2011 and  have a full and frank debate about keeping Gipton operational; an option we think will provide better cover and value for money. 

I wish to draw to your attention the numerous press articles below about our listing  application and also to the firecutscostlives  website which is promoting lively debate on the WYFRS Integrated Risk Management Plans and which is receiving substantial traffic from not only West Yorkshire (approx 75% of hits) but other areas of the country and is getting unsolicited emails of support from as far afield as the United States. 

As we at FCCL believe in openness and transparency we will be publishing any responses of support for a debate at WYFRA to  keep  Gipton operational and also your views on her potential listing as an historic asset. 
If we do not hear from you  - we will also be publishing a list of elected members who choose to ignore this email request for a response within 10 working days. Your opinion on her status either way is important.We at FCCL believe in openness and transparency within the democratic process. Please note we are not suggesting you predetermine yourselves as elected members, we merely wish you to review the status of Gipton in the light of a potential listing. 

Why borrow money to build new - when you can renovated and repair, saving a beautiful building from potential demolition at the same time? 

Article from BBC website is here  HERE   


Morning Star - HERE    


The Guardian  - HERE   


Yorkshire Evening Post  - HERE 

And most importantly the Firecutscostlives website is here  HERE 

Do YOU wish to be the Councillor who was responsible for decimating the fire and rescue service?  

We hope not !  We also have to ask why there are no different options being presented to you at your meeting on December 21st 2012  - why are the proposals so black  & white, yes and no?   

Yours in Unity
The Fire Cuts Cost Lives Team

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Fire Cuts Cost Lives

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Plan B revealed - How to Save Gipton Fire Station

For many months now four of us have been working on  PLAN B.

(although many have indicated they much prefer plan C or should that be G   - but that's top secret and we will reveal it  in early December)

After the quite frankly appalling decision that  the West Yorkshire Fire Authority made  in December 2011 to close 10 fire stations and build 5 new ones, we (community activists Sarah Covell and Sam Hirst , retired firefighter  Andy Killingbeck, & FBU secretary  David Williams)  decided that something had to be done about it.

As we at FCCL are all Leeds based we targeted the old lady of the WYFRS estate 

GIPTON FIRE STATION.

Gipton today held a 75th Birthday Party - attended and indeed opened by the fire services chief hatchet man CFO Simon Pilling. And perhaps that party didn't start off exactly as he planned,  as early this morning the BBC slapped it all over the local front page of their website what we had done. We are so proud we wont stop smirking for a week.  We have  applied to English Heritage to have Gipton Fire Station listed as an historic asset.  See the article Here

In layman terms this means

FCCL  HAVE APPLIED TO HAVE GIPTON FIRE STATION GRADE 2 LISTED

This means several things .................

• She will have to remain basically intact and any alterations be approved by English Heritage and Leeds city council planners
• She will not be allowed to be demolished
• She will if sold need special permission for any planning consent

So  what does this mean for WYFRS?  - Well trying to sell a building with a potential  listing hanging over it will be "challenging"  and will without a doubt mean the price of her will be lower than previously anticipated. 

If we are successful  and she does get grade 2 status - what can you do with a 1930's fire station? 

 ....... keep her operational !!!!

London Fire and Rescue we discovered during our research actually value their old stations and sympathetically restore them whilst keeping them operational. They actually write papers in partnership with English Heritage on the subject of fire station restoration. Read the document HERE

We know as  Gipton is closer to the areas of high risk in the area than the proposed site of South Seacroft for the new station is  it  would make sense  (if WYFRS know the meaning of the word) to keep her open and plough the £££££'s   it will cost to buy the land and build  a station into renovating Gipton to a suitably high standard for the staff who work in her,  whilst retaining her historic value for the community.

We will be informing all our local councillors and MPs of our views and will strongly  urge them to support the listing application 

AND  keeping her operational. 

In the  supposed age of austerity why close a 

VERY HIGH RISK  _ LOW COST STATION 

and build a new one? 

If we are successful of course this will also  bring into consideration the stations at Stanks, Moortown and even Garforth and Hunslet   as the predicted response times etc will invariable change - we believe for the better of the people of  East Leeds.  

And below are a few pics of why we think she should be listed 

She has her original tiled walls and door frame that are not altered 

Her parquet floor upstairs is intact 

And her beautiful curvy appliance bay tiles are SO industrial art deco 

We will tell you more about Giptons history  later  on but for now raise a glass of whatever you fancy  and wish   

Gipton Fire Station a very happy 75th Birthday 

and a long and sustained operational life. 

Fire Brigades Union - Letter to Elected Members

Below is a copy of a recent letter from West Yorkshire Fire Brigades Union to local councillors and MPs. If you find the format difficult to read the text version is available HERE

IF THERE ARE CUTS - WILL PEOPLE DIE ?

IF THERE ARE CUTS - WILL PEOPLE DIE ?

Martyn Redfearn, Assistant Chief Fire Officer 

West Yorkshire Fire & Rescue

 says 

Y E S

In July 2012 the Communities & Local Government Committee held a select committee  to discuss the funding of Fire & Rescue Services. (And at this point we need to say that we are discussing a transcript that non of the attendees have had an opportunity  to correct. We enclose a link to the full document further down this page.)

Below is an article taken from  October issue of Fire Fighter Magazine which is published nationally   by the Fire Brigades Union, in which the above select committee is discussed.  It's a pretty grim read and demonstrates that  many of the officers at the top tables of fire and rescue up and down the country have seriously lost the plot.

The full transcript of the select committee is available HERE    please take the time to read it.

And the BBC news coverage of Martyns "appearance" is here

IRRESPONSIBLE BEYOND BELIEF  ! 

 says David Williams of West Yorkshire FBU. 



Oh to be a fly on the wall ..............

Tonight Chief Fire Officer Simon Pilling meets with Morley Town Council - in secret behind the closed doors of the Town Hall.


Will he charm them with his fancy uniform, shiny buttons and pips on his shoulder. Or will they stand up for the rights of every citizen to have a decent  fire and rescue service.

When the Chips are (Burning the house) Down

Don't FRY and DIE !!!!!

Everybody has seen the demo of the chip pan fire – when the fire fighter  all  togged up in protective clothing drops a cup of water into a chip pan and the flames soar 50 feet in to the air.

No ............... you haven’t !       Well here is the video to get you in the right frame of mind for what comes next. What you need to remember is water expands to 1,700 times its original volume when it is converted to steam, so when the water hits the oil and expands you have 1,700 cups of steam pushing  hot oil and flames into the air and over you.  

Here’s  What NOT To Do......

However if  it is safe to do so - here is how to smother a chip pan fire  (and we cant say that loud enough)  - IF IT IS SAFE TO DO SO - if in any doubt dial 999 and get the fire brigade to deal with it.

So -------- back to the plot .............chip pan fires. 


Since we have been running the firecutscostlives campaign we have been made aware of several chip pan fires  - including sadly the  death in Bradford of a man who by WYFRS criteria lived in a low risk area. The article we posted about this death is available here.  

Regardless of how many smoke alarms you possess if you walk away and leave a chip pan un attended  it will overheat and ignite.  And remember also  - a pan should never be more than a third full of oil or you risk it over flowing and catching fire on the heat source below it.

So whats the answer ........... well under normal circumstances we would say buy a reputable deep fat fryer, used correctly they are designed  to operate within safe temperatures. make sure they are used on a stable surface, and plugged in with the socket adjacent to (not behind) the fryer. So if there is a problem you can safely turn off the electricity supply. And always keep a fire safety blanket in your kitchen (handy if the toaster sets alight too!).

But in reality deep fat fryers are expensive and  many people in west yorks simply cannot afford them. And then of course there is  the urge for fried food when you have come back from a night at the pub and have the munchies.  Chip pans and alcohol  really do not mix......... order a take away curry instead or maybe even  a ...........kebab.

At one point WYFRS used to give away deep fat fryers - until one had an electrical fault and caught fire.

Perhaps vouchers for free oven chips are the answer.................... but until then please be careful if you are deep frying anything tonight.

Should WYFRS buy 1,333 special smoke alarms a year instead of a Assistant Chief Fire Officer (or even 2)?

Hayley from Morley brought to our attention an article in the Fire Training News September Edition. It is about smoke detectors.

A smoke detector has been developed that sends its owner a text when it goes off.It does this by using standard GSM technology for mobile phones. This means it needs its own SIM card. There are moves afoot to develop a smoke detector that uses Wi-Fi. In this way it could send an email. Useful and far less expensive if you have a Smart phone. Many people may want to wait until the price drops
– it’s currently about £90 + SIM card.

NOW after we had stopped laughing - the thought of geting a text whilst you are on holiday did raise a few chuckles - (YOUR HOUSES IS ON FIRE . LOL. Smoke detector XXX)   this technology has some implications for in particular people who are deaf or maybe even for families who have elderly parents as no doubt the SMS message or email could be sent to multiple addresses to warn of danger.

And as to the £90 ---(£89.99 actually) --- if  WYFRS can replace ACOs at £120k each we reckon 1,333 of these smoke alarms may represent better value for money. And as the price of ACO's will no doubt increase year on year and the price of these drop - even better! And you can replace smoke alarms without paying them a pension. 


So how do smoke alarms work...........

BUT H's email raised another eyebrow too.....

It raised concern in the FCCL office as if you read one of our previous posts the consultation documents and processes have recently been succeeded by information about floods in being given "star billing" .

We at FCCL would have thought with the professional media  staff they have at WYFRS they would have thought to have added a direct hyper-link to the consultation pages and not just to the homepage for WYFRS embedded  in the Fire Training News Magazine. Does this mean that WYFRS are trying not to advertise the consultation? 

Yes we think it does! 

and if you would like to read other editions of the fire training newsletter they are available here