DIAL  999……FOR  DELAY?

We need all the support we can get for the long campaign some of us have fought to seek central government recognition of the special and peculiar problems that are posed for all our emergency services by the huge increase in population – and traffic – in the holiday season.    Cornish MPs of all parties have argued for years that all four services (Fire, Ambulance, Police and Coastguards) have been under-funded by successive governments.

Naturally, it is helpful to have the national leadership of the Fire Brigades Union (FBU) on our side, but where were they when the incoming Labour Government failed to alter the funding formula bequeathed by the Conservatives ?  Ministers blatantly refused to reflect the population explosion in Cornwall and Devon in the summer months. 

As the local MP I recall pointing out, when fire swept through St Michael’s Parish Church in Newquay (in June 1993, if my memory serves me), that calling in support from the nearest fire services to Cornwall from the South, West and North would mean attendance of crews from Brittany, New York and Cardiff respectively.   Tory Ministers then, as Labour Ministers now, refused to countenance and adequately increase the budgetary contribution for this relative isolation, or “peninsularity”.

That June we also suffered devastating floods in Bude and other parts of my North Cornwall constituency.  Again, the scattered settlements, and difficult rural terrain between them, added to the difficulty of providing comprehensive emergency cover.  Without any adjoining services on three sides Cornwall had to rely almost exclusively on its own hard-pressed resources.  Devon could cope only marginally better.

At much the same time, central government forced “economies” on the ambulance service here, arguing that amalgamations would improve efficiency.

It was that same summer which saw the Conservative Government trying to force yet further cuts on the Coastguards and on Devon and Cornwall Police.   After the Thatcher-led assault on public services, obsessed by the alleged advantages of privatisation and a commercial ethic which elevated cost considerations above equality of public service delivery, we had hoped for better from John Major.   It was not to be.  Rurality counted for nothing with the Londoner in No 10.   Throughout that Parliament, as spokesman on rural issues in the House of Commons, I was dismayed to see how urban bias had got such a stranglehold on Westminster and Whitehall.

One recent Labour contributor to the letter pages of the Western Morning News seeks to absolve the present Government from responsibility.   After 10 years that is not got good enough.  It is not any longer rational to load all the blame on their predecessors.   Nor is it sufficient to claim that this year’s funding for Cornwall – less than 5% increase on an already low figure – is enough to meet the needs of the fire service or to mitigate the failure for 20 years to recognise our particular problems.

And now we have worsening crises of a similar nature in the ambulance and police services.  Last week we had renewed evidence of the way in which government insistence on bureaucratic targets distorts the provision of adequate ambulance response times in country communities here – they are “stretched to breaking point”, it was said, with direct evidence from within the staff.  Yet further concerns were expressed on these pages about the provision of effective policing in these communities, with the escalating cost of overtime betraying clear under-manning and excessive bureaucracy imposed from Whitehall.   Residents of this part of the country must be feeling that London-centric Ministers and Civil Servants have learnt nothing from the dire experiences of the last two decades. 

Add to these critical problems the continuing lack of affordable housing for the young men and women who staff all the emergency services here, and you can see that the situation is unlikely to get better.   On the morning after the dramatic floods, which engulfed Boscastle, Crackington Haven and surrounding areas of North Cornwall, I was able to make this point direct to John Prescott, when he came to thank these very local heroes.  With the absurd inflation of house prices round the Cornish and Devon coast – due largely to the artificial market for Second Homes – they could not hope to compete.   Lifeboat crews were already suffering, because potential young recruits could not live near the sea.

We can surely claim a special case for our emergency services.   That is why it is so crucial that we have no mixed messages or double standards.  If, for example, the Chief Fire Officer and FBU truly believe that the service in Cornwall is over-stretched and undermanned – especially in August – then this is no time to sanction such an event as the Bodmin Fire Station Beer Festival.   November or February would be more appropriate.  Residents of Mid Cornwall are entitled to expect consistency in this campaign …. and effective firefighting back-up throughout the summer.

The combined effect of the peak holiday invasion (bringing with it congested roads and major road traffic accidents), and our unique geographical location, should give us priority funding.   Successive Governments have chosen to ignore our special case.   If recent tragedies are not to be repeated we must build on the current campaign for proper resourcing by demanding a long term solution to this long term short-changing.

Current delays in responding to 999 calls are bad enough:  further delay in facing up to reality is simply unacceptable.